LADV JOHN RUSSELL 




JOHN RUSSELL AND HER ELDEST SON 

FROM A MINIATURE BY THORBUKN. 1844 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



A MEMOIR 

WITH SELECTIONS FROM HER 
DIARIES AND CORRESPONDENCE 



EDITED BY 

DESMOND MacCARTHY 

AND 

AGATHA RUSSELL 



WITH TWELVE ILLUSTRATIONS, OF WHICH SIX ARE IN COLOUR 



NEW YORK 

JOHN LANE COMPANY 

MCMXI 









Publish®?' 
IRAR2 ISn 



PREFACE 

THE manuscripts which have suppHed the material for 
a memoir of my mother deal much more fully with 
the life of my father than with her own life. Mr. Desmond 
MacCarthy has therefore linked into the narrative several 
important incidents in my father's career. 

The greater part of the memoir is written by Mr. Desmond 
MacCarthy ; the political and historical commentary is almost 
entirely his work. The impartial and independent opinion of 
one outside the family, both in writing the memoir and in 
selecting passages from the manuscripts for publication, has 
been of great value. 

My grateful thanks are due to His Majesty the King for 
giving permission to publish letters from Queen Victoria. 

I am also grateful to friends and relations who have 
placed letters at my disposal ; especially to my brother, whose 
helpful encouragement throughout the work has been most 
valuable. 

Mr. Justin McCarthy, who many years ago recorded 
his impressions of my mother in his Reminiscences, has 
now most kindly contributed to this book a chapter of 
Recollections. 

My cordial thanks are also due to Mr. George Trevelyan 
for reading the proof sheets, and to Mr. Frederic Harrison 
for giving permission to publish his Memorial Address at 
the end of this volume. 



AGATHA RUSSELL 



ROZELDENE, HiNDHEAD, SURREY 

October, igio 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



Chapter I. 1815-34 . . . . i 

Early years — Paris — Lord Minto appointed Minister at Berlin — 
Germany — Return to Minto 

Chapter II. 1835-41 . . . . .21 

Lord Minto First Lord of the Admiralty — Life in London — Bowood — 
Mrs. Drummond's recollections — Friendship with Lord John Russell 
— Putney House — Minto — Admiralty — Her engagement 

Chapter III. 1841 . . . . -45 

Marriage — Sketch of Lord John's career before marriage — His 
conversation with Napoleon — Moore's " Remonstrance " 

Chapter IV. 1841-45 . . . . . '59 

Wilton Crescent — Endsleigh — Chesham Place — Birth of her eldest 
son — Anti-Corn Law agitation — Her illness — Lord John's letter from 
Edinburgh — He is summoned to Osborne — Attempts to form a 
Ministry 

Chapter V. 1846 . . . . . -78 

Illness in Edinburgh — Letters between Lord and Lady John — 
Repeal of the Corn Laws — Ireland and coercion — Lord John Prime 
Minister 

Chapter VI. 1847-52 . , . . . .91 

Pembroke Lodge — Difficulties of the Ministry — Revolution in France 
— Chartism — Petersham School founded by Lord and Lady John — 
The Papal Bull — Durham Letter — The Queen and Lord Palmerston — 
The Coup d'Etat — Breach with Palmerston — Defeat of the Rnissell 
Government — Literary friends 



viii LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

PAGE 

Chapter VII. 1852-55 ...... 123 

Lord Aberdeen Prime Minister — Lord John joins Coalition Ministry — 
Lady John's misgivings— Gladstone's Budget — Death of Lady Minto — 
Samuel Rogers — The Reform Bill — The Crimean War — Withdrawal 
of Reform — Roebuck's motion — Lord John's resignation 



Chapter VIII. 1855 . . . . .148 

Defeat of Aberdeen Ministry — Lord John's Mission to Vienna — He 
accepts Colonial Office in Palmerston Government— Vienna Con- 
ference — His resignation — Lady John's diary and letters 



Chapter IX. 1855-60 . . . . . 164 

Retirement and foreign travel — Palmerston and China — City election 
— Reception at Sheffield — Orsini's attempt upon Napoleon HI — Italy 
and Austria — Lord John's share in the liberation of Italy — Lady John's 
enthusiasm — Garibaldi at Pembroke Lodge 



Chapter X. 1859-66 . . . . . . 190 

Death of Lord Minto — Lord John accepts peerage — ^American Civil 
War — Death of Lord Palmerston — Lord Russell Prime Minister — 
Reform Bill of 1866 — Mr. Lowe and the " Adullamites " — Defeat and 
resignation of the Russell Government 



Chapter XL 1866-70 . . . . . . 209 

Travel in Italy — Entry of Victor Emmanuel into Venice — Disraeli's 
Reform Bill — Irish Church question — Gladstone Prime Minister — 
Winter at San Remo — Paris — Dinner at the Tuileries— Return to 
England 



Chapter XII. 1870-78 ...... 228 

Franco-German War — Renens-sur-Roche — Education question — 
Cannes — Herbert Spencer — Letters from Queen Victoria — Herzego- 
vina — Death of Lord Amberley — Nonconformist deputation at 
Pembroke Lodge — Death of Lord Russell 



Chapter XIII. 1878-98 . . . . .255 

Lady Russell — Her love of children— Literary tastes — Friendships — 
Correspondence — Haslemere — Death of Tennyson — England and 
Ireland — Last meeting of Petersham Scholars — Illness and death 



CONTENTS ix 



PAGE 



Chapter XIV. . . . . . . .289 

Letters from friends — Funeral at Chenies — Poem on Death 



Recollections of Lady Russell. By Justin McCarthy . 293 
Memorial Address by Frederic Harrison . , . 305 

Index ........ 309 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



Lady John Russell and her Eldest Son 

From a miniature by Thorburn. 1844 



Frontispiece 



MiNTo House, Roxburghshire 

From a photograph 



PACING PAGE 

I 



The Countess of Minto, Mother of Lady John Russell 

From a miniature by Sir William Ross. 1851 



32 



Lord John Russell 

From a portrait by G. F. Watts. 1852 



SO 



Pembroke Lodge, East Side, From the Park 

From a water-colour drawing by W. C. Rainbow. 1883 



91 



Pembroke Lodge. From the South Lawn 

From a photograph by Frida Jones. 1902 



121 



Lady John Russell and her Daughter 

From a water-colour drawing by Mary Severn. 1854 



162 



Wild Hyacinths, Pembroke Lodge . 

From a water-colour drawing by Fred Dixey. 1899 



217 



View from the West Walk, Pembroke Lodge 

From an oil painting by Samuel Helstead. i8q6 



233 



The Dowager Countess Russell 

From a photograph. 1884 



295 




MINTO HOUSE. ROXBURGHSHIRE 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



CHAPTER I 

1815-34 

ON November 15, 18 15, at Minto in Roxburghshire, the 
home of the Elliots, a second daughter was born to 
the Earl and Countess of Minto. 

Frances Anna Maria Elliot, who afterwards became the 
first Countess Russell, was destined to a long, eventful life. 
As a girl she lived among those directing the changes of those 
times ; as the wife of a Prime Minister of England unusually 
reticent in superficial relations but open in intimacy, in 
whom the qualities of administrator and politician overlay 
the detachment of sensitive reflection, she came to judge men 
and events by principles drawn from deep feelings and wide 
surveys ; and in the long years of her widowhood, possessing 
still great natural vitality and vivacity of feeling, she continued 
open to the influences of an altered time, delighting and 
astonishing many who might have expected to find between 
her and them the ghostly barrier of a generation. 

She died in January, 1898. The span of her life covers, 
then, many important political events, and we shall catch 
glimpses of these as they aftect her. Though the intention 
of the following pages is biographical, the story of Lady 
Russell's life, after marriage, coincides so closely with her 
husband's public career that the thread connecting her letters 
together must be the political events in which he took part. 
Some of her letters, by throwing light on the sentiments and 
considerations which weighed with him at doubtful junctures. 



2 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

are not without value to the historian. It is not, however, the 
historian who has been chiefly considered in putting them 
together, but rather the general reader, who may find his 
notions of past politics vivified and refreshed by following 
history in the contemporary comments of one so passionately 
and so personally interested at every turn of events. 

Another motive has also had a part in determining the 
possessors of Lady Russell's letters to publish them. Memory 
is the most sacred, but also the most perishable of shrines ; 
hence it sometimes seems well worth while to break through 
reticence to give greater permanence to precious recollections. 
With this end also the following pages have been put together, 
and many small details included to help the subject of this 
memoir to live again in the imagination of the reader. For 
from brief and even superficial contact with the living we may 
gain much ; but the dead, if they are to be known at all, must 
be known more intimately. 

Minto House, where Lady Fanny was born, is beautifully 
situated above a steep and wooded glen, and is only a short 
distance from the river Teviot. The hills around are not like 
the wild rugged mountains of the Highlands, but have a soft 
and tender beauty of their own. Her childhood was far more 
secluded than the life that would have fallen to her lot had she 
been born in the next generation, for her home in Roxburgh- 
shire, in coach and turnpike days, was more remote from the 
central stir and business of life than any spot in the United 
Kingdom at the present time. Lady Fanny used to relate 
what a great event it was for the household at Minto when on 
very rare occasions her father brought from London a parcel 
of new books, which were eagerly opened by the family and 
read with delight. Those were not the days of circulating 
libraries, and both the old standard books on the Minto 
library shelves and the few new ones occasionally added were 
read and re-read with a thoroughness rare among modern 
readers, surrounded by a multiplicity of books old and new. 

They were a large, young family, five boys and five girls, 
ranging from the ages of three years old to eighteen in 1830^ 



1 815-34] EARLY YEARS 3 

when her diaries begin, all eager, high-spirited children, 
and exceptionally strong and healthy. In her early diaries, 
describing day-long journeys in coaches, early starts and late 
arrivals, she hardly ever mentions feeling tired, and she enjoyed 
the old methods of travelling infinitely more than the railway 
journeys of later days, about which she felt like the Frenchman 
who said : " On ne voyage plus ; on arrive." Long wild 
country walks in Scotland and mountain-climbing in Switzer- 
land were particularly delightful to her. 

This stock of sound vitality stood her in good stead all her 
life ; only during those years which followed the birth of her 
eldest son does it seem to have failed her. Her life was an 
exceptionally busy one, and her strong feelings and sense of 
responsibility made even small domestic affairs matters for 
close attention ; yet in the diaries and letters of her later life 
there are no entries which betray either the lassitude or the 
restlessness of fatigue. She was not one of those busy women 
who only keep pace with their interests by deputing home 
management to others. This power of endurance in a deeply 
feeling nature is one of the first facts which any one attempting 
to tell the story of her life must bring before the reader's 
notice. 

There was much reading aloud in the fireside circle at 
Minto, and for the boys much riding and sport. Many hours 
were spent upon the heather or in fishing the Teviot. Lady 
Fanny herself cared little for sport, or only for its picturesque 
side. Near the house are the rocks known as Minto Crags, 
mentioned by Sir Walter Scott in the "Lay of the Last 
Minstrel," where many and many a time Lady Fanny raced 
about on hunting days, watching the redcoats with childish 
eagerness — intensely interested in the joyousness and beauty 
of the sight, but in her heart always secretly thankful if the fox 
escaped. Fox-hunting on Minto Crags must indeed have been 
a picturesque sight, and there was a special rock overhanging 
a precipice upon which she loved to sit and watch the wild 
chase, men and horses appearing and disappearing with 
flashing rapidity among the woods and ravines beneath. The 
pleasures of an open-air life meant so much to her that, in so 



4 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

far as it was possible for one with her temperament to pine 
at all, she was often homesick in the town, longing for the 
peace and freedom of the country. 

There were expeditions of other kinds too. 

"Gibby^ and I/' she writes towards the end of one October, 
" up a little after five this morning and up the big hill to see the 
sun rise. It was moonlight when we went out, and all so still and 
indistinct — for it was a cloudy moon — that our steps and voices 
sounded quite odd. It was mild enough, but so wet with dew that 
our feet grew very cold. We waited some time on the top before 
he rose and had a long talk with the Kaims shepherd. It was 
well worth having gone ; though there was nothing fine in the sky 
or clouds compared to what I have constantly seen at sunrise. 
But what I thought beautiful was the entire change that his rising 
made in everything. All we were looking at suddenly became so 
bright and cheerful, and a hum of people and noises of animals 
were heard from the village." " I wish people," she adds im- 
petuously, " would shake off sleep as soon as the blushing morn 
does peep in at their windows." 

The entries in these early diaries show a quality of clear 
authentic vision, which was afterwards so characteristic of 
her conversation. For those who remember their own 
youthful feelings, even the stiff occasional scraps of poetry 
she wrote at this time glow with a life not always discernible 
in the deft writing of more experienced verse-makers. 

The household was a brisk, cheerful, active one, and ruled 
by the spirit of order necessary in a home where many 
different kinds of things are being done each day by its 
different inmates. The children were treated with no parti- 
cular indulgence, and the elder ones were taught to be 
responsible not only for their own actions, but for the good 
behaviour, and, in a certain measure, for the education of the 
younger ones. As a girl she writes down in her diary many 
hopes and fears about her younger brothers and sisters, which 
resemble those afterwards awakened in her by the care of her 
own children. A big family in a great house, with all the 
different relations and contacts such a life implies, is in itself 
an education, and Lady Fanny seems to have profited by all 

' Her brother Gilbert. 



1815-34] LIFE AT MINTO 5 

that such experiences can give. If she came from such a 
home anticipating from everybody more loyalty and con- 
sistency of feeling than is common in human nature, and 
crediting everybody with it, that is in itself a kind of generous 
severity of expectation which, though it may be sometimes the 
cause of mistakes, helps also to create in others the qualities it 
looks to find. 

The children had plenty of outlets for their high spirits. 
There are some slight records left of the opening of a 
" Theatre Royal, Minto," and of a glorious evening ending in 
an "excellent country bumpkin," with bed at two in the 
morning ; of reels and dances, too, and many hours laconi- 
cally summed up as " famous fun " in the diary. Then there 
were such September days as this : 

" Bob'm ^ and I went in the phaeton to meet the boys. They 
were very successful — about twelve brace. The heather was in 
full blow, and in wet parts the ground white with parnassia. I 
never felt such an air — it made me feel quite wild. The sunset 
behind the far hills and reflected in the lonely little shaw loch 
most beautiful. When we began our walk there was a fine 
soft wind that felt as if it would lift one up to the clouds, but 
before we got back to the little house it had quite fallen, and all 
was as still as in a desert, except now and then the wild cry of the 
grouse and black-cock. Bob'm mad with spirits, and talked non- 
sense all the way home. Not too dark to see the beautiful outline 
of the country all the way." 

Such tired, happy home-comings stay in the memory ; drives 
back at the end of long days, when scraps of talk and laughter 
and the pleasure of being together mingle so kindly with 
the solemnity of the darkening country ; drives which end in 
a sudden blaze of welcome, in fire-light and candles, tea and 
a hubbub of talk, when everything, though familiar, seems 
to confess to a new happiness. 

Here is another entry a few days later : 

" Beautiful day, but a very high, warm real Minto wind. We 
wandered out very late and sat under the lime, playing at being at 

^ Her sister Charlotte, afterwards Lady Charlotte Portal. 



6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

sea, feeling the stem rock above us as we lent against it and hear- 
ing the roaring of the waves in the trees. No summer's day can 
be better than such a day and evening as this — there was a cloudy 
moon, too, above the branches. I wish I could express, but I 
never can, the sort of feeling I have at times — now more than I 
ever had before — which would sound like affectation if one talked 
of it. A fine day, or beautiful country, or very often nothing but 
the sky or earth or the singing of a bird gives it. One feels too 
much love and gratitude and admiration, and something swells my 
heart so that I do not know how to look or listen enough." 

There was another kind of romance, too, in her young 
life, destined in future to be at times a source of pain and 
anxiety, though also of keen gratification and permanent 
pride. What can equal the romance of politics when we are 
quite young, when " politics " mean nothing but " serving 
one's country" and have no other associations but that one, 
when politicians seem necessarily great men ? The love- 
dreams of adolescence have often been celebrated ; but 
among young creatures whose lives give plenty of play to 
their affections in a spontaneous way, such dreams seldom vie 
in intensity with the mysterious call of religion or with the 
emotion of patriotism. It stands for an emotion which seems 
as large as the love of mankind, and its service calls for 
enthusiasm and self-devotion. The Mintos were in the thick 
of politics and the times were stirring times. " Throughout 
the last two centuries of our history," says Sir George 
Trevelyan in his Life of Macaulay, " there never was a 
period when a man, conscious of power, impatient of public 
wrongs, and still young enough to love a fight for its own 
sake, could have entered Parliament with a fairer prospect of 
leading a life worth living and doing work that would requite 
the pains, than at the commencement of the year 1830." Her 
father was not only the most genial and kindest of fathers, but 
he was to her something of a hero too. His political career 
had not begun during these days at Minto ; still he was in 
the counsel of the leaders of the day — Lord Grey, Lord John 
Russell, Lords Melbourne and Althorp — great names indeed 
to her. And the new Cabinet was soon to appoint him 
Minister at Berlin. 



1815-34] LIFE AT MINTO 7 

The country was under the personal rule of the Duke of 
Wellington, who had sorted out from his Cabinet any who 
were tainted with sympathy for reform ; but, as the election of 
July which resulted in his resignation showed, the country, 
however one-sided its representation might have been in the 
House of Commons, had been long in a state of political 
ferment. This state of affairs, the gradual breaking up of the 
Tory party dating from the passing of the Catholic Emancipa- 
tion Bill, the brewing social troubles, and the prospect of 
power crossing to the party which was determined on meeting 
them with reform, made politics everywhere the most absorb- 
ing of themes. 

In a country house like Minto, which was in close com- 
munication with the statesmen of the time, discussions were 
of course frequent and keen. The guests were often important 
politicians ; and long before Lady Fanny saw her future 
husband, she frequently heard his name as one whom those 
she admired looked up to as a leader. In a girl by nature 
very susceptible to the appeal of great causes, whose active 
brain made her delight in the arguments of her elders, these 
surroundings were likely to foster a passionate interest in public 
affairs ; while other influences round her were tending to 
increase in her a natural sense of the delicacy and precious- 
ness of personal relations. In the course of telling her story 
occasions may come for remarking again on what was one of 
the chief graces of her character ; but in a book of this kind 
the sooner the reader becomes acquainted with the subject of 
it, the more he is likely to see in what follows. So let it be 
said of her at once that in all relations in which affection was 
complicated on one side by gratitude, or on her side by 
superiority in education or social position, she was perfect. 
She could be employer and benefactress without letting such 
circumstances deflect in the slightest degree the stream of 
confidence and affection between her and another. She had 
the faculty of removing a sense of obligation and of forgetting 
it herself. Such a faculty is only found in its perfection where 
the mind is sensitive in perceiving the delicacy of the relations 
between people ; and it must be added that like most people 



8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

who possess that sensitiveness, she missed it acutely in those 
who markedly did not. 

The life at Minto, with its many contacts, was a life in 
which such a faculty could grow to perfection. The daughters, 
while sharing much of the boys' lives at Minto, saw a great 
deal of the people upon the estate. 

The intercourse between the family at the House and the 
people of Minto village was of an intimate and affectionate 
nature. Joys and sorrows were shared in unvarying friendli- 
ness and sympathy, and to the end of her life " Lady 
Fanny" remembered with warm affection the old village 
friends of her youth. Kindly, true-hearted folk they were, 
with a sturdy and independent spirit which she valued and 
respected. 

She only remembered seeing Sir Walter Scott on one 
occasion — when he came to visit her parents. She was 
quite a child, and it was the day on which her old nurse left 
Minto. She had wept bitterly, and when Sir Walter Scott 
came she hardly dared even look at him with her tearful 
countenance. She always remembered regretfully her indif- 
ference about the great man, whose visit was ever after con- 
nected in her mind with one of the first sorrows of her 
childhood. She regretted still more that in those days political 
differences unhappily prevented the close and friendly inter- 
course which would otherwise have undoubtedly existed 
between the Minto family and Sir Walter Scott. 

A word or two must be said upon the religion in which she 
was brought up, for from her childhood she was deeply 
religious. Like her love for those nearest to her, it entered 
into everything that interested or delighted her profoundly ; 
into her interest in politics and social questions and into her 
enjoyment of nature. 

The Mintos belonged to the Presbyterian Church of Scot- 
land. The doctrines of this Church are not of significance 
here, but an indication of the attitude towards dogma, history, 
and conduct which harmonizes with these tenets is necessary 
to the understanding of her life. For this purpose it is only 
necessary to say that this Church belongs to that half of 



1815-34] LADY MINTO 9 

Protestantism which does not lay pecuHar stress upon an inner 
conviction of salvation. It differs from the evangelical per- 
suasions in this respect, and again from the Church of Eng- 
land in finding less significance in ecclesiastical symbols, in 
setting less store by traditional usages, and in a more con- 
stant and uncompromising disapproval of any doctrine which 
regards the clergy as having spiritual functions or privileges 
different from those of other men. In the latter half of her 
life she came gradually to a Unitarian faith, which she held 
with earnestness to the last ; and the name " Free Church " 
became more significant to her through the suggestion it 
carried of a religion detached from creeds and articles. Many 
entries occur in her diaries protesting against what she felt as 
mischievous narrowness in the books she read and in the 
sermons she heard. She sympathized heartily with Lord John 
Russell's dislike of the Oxford movement. There are many 
prayers in her diaries and many religious reflections in her 
letters, and in all two emotions predominate ; a trust in 
God and an earnest conviction that a life of love — love to 
God and man — is the heart of religion. Her religion was 
contemplative as well as practical ; but it was a religion of 
the conscience rather than one of mystical emotions. 

Of personal influences, her mother's, until marriage, was 
the strongest. There are only two long breaks in the diary 
she kept, when she had no heart to write down her thoughts ; 
one occurs during the year of Lady Minto's long and serious 
illness at Berlin, which began in 1832, and the other after 
Lord John Russell's death in 1878. 

Lady Minto was not strong ; bringing many sons and 
daughters into the world had tried her; and her delicacy 
seems to have drawn her children closer round her. Lady 
Fanny's references to her mother are full of an anxious, 
protective devotion, as though she were always watching to 
see if any shadow of physical or mental trouble were threaten- 
ing her. So in imagining the merry, active life of this large 
family, the presence of a mother most tenderly loved, from 
whom praise seemed something almost too good to be true, 
must not be forgotten. 



lo LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

In November, 1830 (the year Lady Fanny's diaries begin), 
the Duke of Wellington resigned, having emphatically declared 
that the system of representation ought to possess, and did 
possess, the entire confidence of the country. He had gone 
so far as to say that the wit of man could not have devised 
a better representative system than that which Lord John 
Russell, in the previous session, had attempted to alter by 
proposing to enfranchise Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham. 
But the election which followed the death of George IV on 
June 26th had not borne out the Duke's assertion ; it had 
gone heavily against him. Lord Grey, forming his Ministry 
out of the old Whigs and the followers of Canning and 
Grenville, at once made Reform a Cabinet measure. During 
the stormy elections of July the news came from Paris that 
Charles X had been deposed, and unlike the news of the 
French Revolution, it acted as a stimulus, not as a check, 
to the reforming party in England. 

The next entry quoted from Lady Fanny's diary, begun at 
the age of fourteen, is dated November 22, 1830 ; the family were 
travelling towards Paris, matters having almost quieted down 
there. Louis Philippe had been recognized by England as 
King of the French the month before, and the only side of 
the revolution which came under her young eyes was the 
somewhat vamped up enthusiasm for the Citizen King which 
followed his acceptance of the crown and tricolor. It is said 
that any small boy in those days could exhibit the King to 
curious sightseers by raising a cheer outside the Tuileries 
windows, when His Majesty, to whom any manifestation of 
enthusiasm was extremely precious, would appear auto- 
matically upon the balcony and bow. But there were 
traces of agitation still to be felt up and down the country, 
and over Paris hung that deceptive, stolid air of indiffe- 
rence which is so puzzling a characteristic of crises in 
France. 

The Mintos travelled in several carriages with a consider- 
able retinue, with a doctor and servants, but not with a train 
which, in those days, would have been thought remarkable for 
an English peer. 



1815-34] PARIS II 

Melun, November 22, 1830 ^ 

We left Sens at half past eight and did not stop to dine, but 
ate in the carriage. We passed through Fossard, Monteran, and 
got here about four. The doctor is quite grave about his tricolor 
and has worn it all day. We have had immense laughing at him. 
He was very much frightened at Sens, because Papa told him the 
people of the hotel were for the Bourbons and were angry with 
him for wearing the tricolor. A great many post-boys have it 
on their hats and all the fleurs-de-lis on the mile-posts are 
rubbed out. 



By this date Charles X, surrounded by his gloomy, cere- 
monial little court of faithful followers, was playing his nightly 
game of whist in the melancholy shelter of Holyrood, where 
he was to remain for the next two years, an insipid, sorrowful 
figure, distinguished by such dignity as unquerulous passivity 
can lend to the foolish and unfortunate. Meanwhile, Paris 
was attempting to vamp up some interest in her new King, who 
walked the streets with an umbrella under his arm. 



Paris, December 23, 1830 

We were in the Place Vendome to-day, which was full of 
national guards waiting for the King. We stopped to see him. 
It looked very gay and pretty : the National Guard held hands in a 
long row and danced for ever so long round and round the pillar, 
with the people shouting as hard as they could. It looked very 
funny, but the King did not come whilst we were there. We 
heard them singing the Parisienne. The trial is over and the 
ministers are at Vincennes, going to be put in prison. There 
have been several mobs about the Luxembourg and the Palais 
Royal, but they think nothing more will happen now. 



Who can hum now the tune of the " Parisienne " ? It has 
not stayed in men's memories like the " Marseillaise " ; no 
doubt it expressed the prosaic, middle-class spirit of the 
National Guard, which kept a King upon the throne, in his 
own way just as determined as his predecessors to rule in the 
interests of his family. 

^ All extracts not otherwise specified are from Lady John Russell's 
diary. 



12 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

Paris, February 5, 1831 

Mama, Papa, Mary, Lizzy,^ Charlie, Doddy "" and I have been 
to a children's ball at the Palais Royal. It was the most beautiful 
thing I ever saw, and we danced all night long, but no big people 
at all danced. We saw famously all the royal people ; and Lizzy 
danced with two of the little princes. The Duke of Orleans and 
M. Due de Nemours were in uniform and so were all the other 
gentlemen. The King and Queen are nice-looking old bodies. It 
was capital fun and very merry indeed, the supper was beautiful. 
There was famous galloping.3 



Paris, February 15, 183 1 

This is Mardi gras, the last day of the Carnival. We were out 
in the carriage this morning to see the masks on the boulevards ; 
there were a great many masks and crowds of people, whilst there 
were mobs and rows going on in another part of the town. The 
people have quite destroyed the poor Archbishop's house, because 
on Sunday night the Due de Bordeaux's bust was brought, and 
Mass was said for the Due de Berry. They have taken all his 
books, furniture, and everything, and they wanted to throw some 
priests in the Seine, and they are breaking the things in the 
churches and taking down the crosses. All the National Guard 
is out. 

These disturbances were the last struggles of the party who 
had not been satisfied by the spectacle of the son of Philippe 
Egalite, with the tricolor flag in one hand, embracing the 
ancient Lafayette on the balcony above the Place de Gr^ve. 
Their animosity against the Church was the ground-swell of 
the storm which had washed away Charles X himself. The 
Sacrilege Law introduced in 1825 had revived the barbarous 
mediaeval penalty of amputating the hand of the offender. 
Charles's attempt to reintroduce primogeniture by declaring 
the French principle of the equal division of property to be 
inconsistent with the principle of monarchy had irritated 
the people less than the encouragement he had given to 

' Her sisters Mary and Elizabeth, afterwards Lady Mary Abercromby 
and Lady Elizabeth Romilly. 

' Her brothers Charles and George. 

3 The next time she was to see the " old bodies " was on her own lawn 
at Pembroke Lodge, where she heard from the King the unimpressive 
story of " ma chute." 



I8I5-34] PARIS 13 

monastic corporations which were contrary to law. The 
controversy which followed between the ecclesiastics and 
their opponents was the cause of the repeal of the freedom 
of the Press ; and when he had stifled controversy his next 
step was the suspension of Parliament. Whence followed 
the events which so abruptly disturbed his evening rubber at 
St. Cloud on July 25th. 

These outbreaks of the republican anti-clerical party to 
which Lady Fanny refers were soon calmed ; a few weeks 
later the soldiers had no more work to do, and a grand review 
was held in the Champ de Mars. 

Paris, March 27, 1831 

We all went in the carriage to the heights of the Trocadero 
and there got out. It was very pretty to look down at the Champ 
de Mars, which was quite full of soldiers, who sometimes ranged 
themselves in lines and sometimes in nice little bundles and 
squares. In front of the Ecole Militaire was a fine tent for the 
Queen and Princesses. The King and the Due de Nemours rode 
about, and there were some loud cries of '* Vive le Roi." Less than 
a year ago in the same place we saw old Charles X reviewing his 
soldiers and heard " Vive le Roi " shouted for him and saw white 
flags waving about the Champs de Mars instead of tricolor. 
It seems so odd that it should all be changed in so short a time, 
and spoils the "Vive le Roi" very much, because it makes one 
think they do not care really for him. 

Paris, April 2, 1831 

We had a long walk with Mama to the places where the 
people that were killed in July were buried. There are tricolor 
flags over them all, and the flowers and crowns of everlastings 
were all nicely arranged about the tombs. Amongst them was the 
kennel of a poor dog whose master was one of the killed, which 
has come every day since and lain on his grave. The dog itself 
was not in. The poor Swiss are buried there, too, but without 
flowers or crowns or railings, or even stones, to show the place. 



She had been " wishing horridly for fields and trees and 
grass" for some time past; on June 16, 1831, they were all 
back again in England. 



14 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

Dover, June 16, 1831 

Everything seems odd here ; pokers and leather harness, all the 
women and girls with bonnets and long petticoats and shawls 
and flounces and comfortable poky straw bonnets, and boys so 
nicely dressed, and urns and small panes (no glasses and no 
clocks), trays, good bread, and everybody with clean and fresh 
and pretty faces. We have been walking this evening by the sea, 
and all the English look very odd ; they all look hangy and loose, 
so different from the Paris ladies, laced so tight they can hardly 
walk, and the men and boys look ten times better. 



Rochester, June 17, 1831 

We did not leave Dover till near twelve— the country has 
really been beautiful to-day ; all the beautiful gentlemen's places 
with large trees, and the pretty hedges all along the road full of 
honeysuckle and roses ; clean cows and white fat sheep feeding 
in most beautiful rich green grass ; the nicest little cottages with 
lattice windows and thatched roofs and neat gardens, and roses, 
ivy, and honeysuckle creeping to the tops of the chimneys ; 
everybody and everything clean and tidy. . . . The cart-horses 
are beautiful, and even the beggars look as if they washed their 
faces. 

October 9, 1831, Bognor 

We heard this morning of the loss of the Reform Bill, and we 
were at first all very sorry, but in a little while rather glad 
because it gives us a chance of Minto. When the people of 
Bognor heard it was lost, they took the flowers and ribands off 
that they had dressed up the coaches with, thinking it had passed, 
and put them in mourning. 



Lord John Russell had introduced the first Reform Bill on 
March i, 1831 ; this was carried by a majority of one ; but in 
a later division the Government was defeated by a majority of 
eight, and Parliament was dissolved. The elections resulted 
in an emphatic verdict in favour of Reform, and on June 24th 
Lord John introduced the second Reform Bill, which was 
carried by a large majority in the House of Commons. He 
had proposed to disfranchise partially or completely no 
boroughs ; a proposition which had seemed so revolutionary 
that it was at first received with laughter by the Opposition, 



1815-34] REFORM BILL 15 

who were confident no such measure could ever pass. Lord 
Minto had returned from France to support this Bill in the 
Lords, which on his arrival he found had been rejected by 
them in a division on the 8th of October. The rejection 
of the Bill was followed by disturbances throughout the 
country. Several members of the House of Lords were 
mobbed, Nottingham Castle was burnt down, and there was 
fighting and bloodshed in the streets of Bristol. Before the 
third Reform Bill was brought forward and carried by a huge 
majority in the Commons, the whole Minto family were on 
their way North. 

Lady Fanny announces the fact of her arrival at her 
beloved home with many ecstatic exclamation marks. 

November 2, 1831, Minto ! ! ! ! 

Between Longtown and Langham we passed the toll that 
divides England and Scotland. Harry and the coachman waved 
their hats and all heads were poked out at window. 

The moment we got into Scotland it felt much finer, the sun 
shone brighter and the country really became far prettier. We 
went along above the Esk, which is a little rattling, rumbling, 
clear, rocky river, prettier than any we ever saw in England. . . . 

As we drove into Langham we were much surprised by a loud 
cheer from some men and boys at the roadside, who all threw off 
their caps as we passed. While we were changing, a man offered 
to Papa that they would drag him through the town ; Papa 
thanked him very much but said he would rather not ; so the 
man said perhaps he would prefer three cheers, which they gave 
as we drove off. . . . The whole town crowded round the car- 
riages. Just as we were setting off, however, we were very much 
surprised to see numbers of people take the pole of the little 
carriage and run off with Papa and Mama with all their might. 
They spun all through the town at a fine rate, and did not 
stop for ever so long. There was immense cheering as we drove 
off, and the people ran after us ever so far . . . The house all 
looked beautiful, and this evening we feel as if we had never 
left Minto. 

But she was not to stay there long, for early in 1832 they 
went to Roehampton House, near London, and the same year 
Lord Minto was appointed Minister at Berlin. 

At this time Berlin was not a capital of sufficient dignity 



i6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

to entitle it to an embassy ; but considering the state of 
European politics, the appointment was one of some diplo- 
matic importance. 

Germany was at the beginning of her task of consolidation. 
The revolution of July had not been without its effect on her. 
In the southern States the cause of representative government 
was not wholly powerless ; but it had been weakened by the 
reaction after 1815. Since the government was no longer an 
undisguised tyranny and since the people themselves were 
growing richer, a strong sentiment of personal loyalty to the 
sovereign began to spread among them. Constitutional 
changes were therefore indefinitely postponed. The great work 
of the next few years for Prussian statesmen was the removal 
of commercial barriers between the various German States, 
and the establishment of a Zollverein between them. In 
this way the sway of Austria was weakened, and though 
political union as an aim was carefully kept in the back- 
ground, the foundation for the subsequent consolidation of 
the German Empire was securely laid. During the two 
central years of this process, 1832-4, Lord Minto was at 
Berlin. The manners of the time were far simpler and the 
life at the court far more informal than they were soon 
to become. Law and custom still preserved some lingering 
barbarities : during their stay at Wittenberg they heard of 
a man being broken on the wheeL 

They stopped at Brussels on the way. There is a charac- 
teristic entry in Lady Fanny's diary describing a visit to the 
battle-field. 

Namur, Sepiembet 6, 1832 

We coach-people left Brussels much earlier than the others 
that we might have time to walk about Waterloo. . . . 

They showed us the house where the Duke of Wellington 
slept the night before and the night after the battle and wrote 
home his dispatches ; then after a long and fierce dispute between 
a man and woman which was to guide us, the man took us to the 
Church, where we saw the monuments of immense numbers of 
poor common soldiers and officers — then to the place where four 
hundred are buried all together and one sees their graves just 
raised above the rest of the ground. Then we drove to the field 



1815-34] BERLIN 17 

of battle, and the man showed us everything ; it was very nice and 
very sad to hear all about, but as I shall always remember it, I 
need say nothing about it. We are quite in a rage about a great 
mound that the Dutch have put up with a great yellow lion on the 
top, only because the Prince of Orange was wounded there, quite 
altering the ground from what it was at the time of the battle. The 
monument to Lord Anglesea's leg too, which we did not of course 
go to see, makes one very angry, as if he was the only one who was 
wounded there — and only wounded too when such thousands of poor 
men were killed and have nothing at all to mark the place where 
they are buried ; and I think they are the people one feels most 
for, for though they do all they can, after they are dead one never 
hears any more about them. 

Soon after their arrival at Berlin, Lady Minto fell danger- 
ously ill. From September, 1832, there is a long gap in Lady 
Fanny's diary, for she had no heart to set anything down. This 
long stretch of anxiety coming when she was sixteen years old, 
if it did not change her nature, brought to light new qualities 
which were to mark her character henceforward. There is a 
little entry written down eight years afterwards on the birth- 
day of her sister Charlotte which shows that she, as well as 
others, looked back on this time as a turning-point in her life. 

Bob'm sixteen to-day, just the age I began to be unhappy, 
because I began to think. Heaven spare her from the doubts 
and fears that tormented me. 

During the months of her mother's gradual recovery she 
seems each day to have been happier than on the one before. 

June 6, 1833, Potsdam 

At a little before eleven this morning, Mary, Ginkie, Henry,^ 
Mr. Lettsom^ and I set off from Berlin in a very curious 
rickety machine of a carriage, to leave Mama for a whole day 
and night, which feels very impossible, and is the best sign of 
her (health) that one could have. We were very happy and we 
thought everything looking very nice. We were sorry to see no 
friends as we left Berlin, for we looked so beautiful in our jolting 
little conveyance with four horses and a post-boy blowing the old 
tune on his horn. 

' Her brother, afterwards Sir Henry Elliot. 
= The tutor. 



i8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

To escape the heat of Berlin they moved out to 
Freienwalde. 



June 14, 1833, Freienwalde 

A beautiful morning, and at about 10 they all set off from 
Berlin, leaving Mama, Papa, Bob'm and I to follow after in the 
coach. After they went, there were two long hours of going 
backwards and forwards through the empty rooms, then having 
said a sad good-bye to Senden,^ Hymen,' Mr. Lettsom and Fitz, 
though we know we shall see them again soon, we got into the 
coach with the squirrel in a bag and drove off. I could not help 
feeling very sorry to leave it all, though it will be so very nice to 
be out of it, but I knew we should never be all there again as we 
have been, and all the misery we have had in that house makes 
one feel still more all the happiness of the last month there. 

There is nothing to say of the country, for it is the same as on 
all the other sides of Berlin ; the soil more horrid than anything I 
ever saw, and of course all as flat as water, but just now and then 
some rather nice villages. . . . After about two hours there we 
came on, first through nice, small Scotch fir woods, then quite 
ugly again till near here, when we got into really pretty banks of 
oak, beech, and fir, down a real steep road and along a nice narrow 
lane till we got here, where they were all standing on the steps of 
our mansion ready to receive us. Mama was carried to the 
drawing-room . . . before the house is a wee sort of border all 
full of weeds, but nothing like a garden or place belonging to the 
house, but there seem very few people ; then there is a terrace, 
which is very nice though it is public. Mama is not the least tired 
and quite pleased with it all. It is very, very nice to be here, able 
to go out without our things and expecting no company, and what 
at first one feels more nice than everything, not having any 
carriages or noises out of doors ; for eight months and a half we 
have never been without that horrid, constant rumbling in the 
streets. It is very odd to feel ourselves here ; unlike any place I 
ever lived in. The bath house is close by, but that is the only 
house near us. 

There they lived all the summer the life that they liked best. 
They lost themselves in the forest, they read aloud, and they 
enjoyed the rustic theatre. The autumn brought visits to 
Teplitz and Dresden. 

They were back in Berlin for the winter and early spring, 
when she began to take more part in society. 

' German friends at Berlin. 



1815-34] RETURN TO MINTO 19 

April I, 1834, Berlin 

Stupid dinner of old gentlemen. Mary still being rather 
silly ^ did not dine at table. ... It was very awful to be alone, 
but at dinner I was happy enough as Loven sat on one side of me. 
Humboldt was on the other. Afterwards came Fitz for a moment 
and Deken and Bismarck. 

April 5, 1834, Berlin 

I sat the second quadrille by my stupidity in refusing Bismarck. 

Early in May came " the hateful morning of good-byes " 
to friends in Berlin, and at Marienbad Lord Minto heard the 
news that Lord Grey had resigned owing to Lord Althorp's 
refusal to agree to the Irish Coercion Bill. Lord Melbourne 
succeeded him as Prime Minister. Lord Minto had not long 
returned to England when the King summarily dismissed 
Lord Melbourne and a provisional Government under the 
Duke of Wellington was patched together until Sir Robert 
Peel should return from abroad. The governorship of 
Canada had been offered meanwhile to Lord Minto, and 
the family started on their home journey fearing they would 
have to leave England immediately for Quebec. But this did 
not happen, and December found them at last once more 
on the road to Minto. The girls wrote poems celebrating 
their return on the journey, and tried every cure for 
impatience as the carriage rolled along. 

Minto, Thursday, December 25, 1834 

We left Carlisle about eight, and for the three first stages were 
so slowly driven that our patience was nearly gone. To make 
it last a little longer Mary read some "Hamlet" aloud between 
Longtown and Langholme, and I had a nap. ... As soon as 
we entered Hawick we were surrounded by an immense crowd. 
. . . The bells rang, there were flags hung all along the street, 
and fine shouting as we set off. Papa, which we did not know 
at the time, had to make a little speech, and contradict a shameful 
report of his having taken office. A few minutes on this side of 
Hawick we met the two boys and Robert riding to meet us, looking 
lovely. Our own country looked really beautiful ; rocks, hills, and 
Rubers Law all seemed to have grown higher. We passed the 

' Scotch for unwell. 



20 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1815-34 

awful ford in safety across our own lovely Teviot, and soon found 
ourselves at Nelly's Lodge, where old Nelly opened the gate to 
us. . . . The trees looked large and fine — in short, everything 
perfect. Catherine, Mrs. Fraser, and Wales received us at the 
door, and in a few minutes we were scattered all over the house. 
We spent a most happy evening. . . . This has really been a 
happy Christmas. It is wonderful to be here. 

At this point Lady Fanny's early girlhood may be said to 
end. Her life in London society and the events which led 
to her marriage will be told in the next chapter. 



CHAPTER II 

1835-41 

WHILE the Minto family were still on their way 
home from Germany a startling incident occurred in 
English politics. One morning a paragraph appeared in the 
Times announcing the fact that the King had dismissed Lord 
Melbourne. 

We have no authority (it ran) for the important statement 
which follows, but we have every reason to believe that it is 
perfectly true. We give it without any comment or amplifica- 
tion, in the very words of the communication, which reached 
us at a late hour last night. "The King has taken the oppor- 
tunity of Lord Spencer's death to turn out the Ministry, and 
there is every reason to believe the Duke of Wellington has 
been sent for. The Queen has done it all." 

(The authority upon which the Times was relying was that 
of the Lord Chancellor.) 

So on coming down to breakfast that morning the 
Ministers, having received no private communication what- 
ever, read to their amazement that they had been already 
dismissed. Brougham had surreptitiously conveyed the 
information in order to embarrass the Court. The general 
trend of political gossip at the time was expressed by 
Palmerston, who wrote : 

It is impossible to doubt that this has been a preconcerted 
measure and that the Duke of Wellington is prepared at once 
to form a Government. Peel is abroad ; but it is not likely he 
would have gone away without a previous understanding one way 
or the other with the Duke, as to what he would do if a crisis 
were to arise. 



22 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

As a matter of fact there had been no concerted plan. It 
was the first and last independent step William IV ever took, 
and a most unconstitutional instance of royal interference. 
The Duke, summoned by the King, expressed his willingness 
to occupy any position His Majesty thought fit, but con- 
sidering the Liberal majority in the House of Commons 
was two to one, and it was but two years since the Reform 
Bill passed, he did his best to dissuade the King from dis- 
missing all his Ministers. During the interview the King's 
secretary entered and called the attention of the King to the 
paragraph in the Times that morning, which concluded with 
the statement that the Queen had done it all. " There, Duke, 
you see how I am insulted and betrayed ; nobody in London 
but Melbourne knew last night what had taken place here, nor 
of my sending for you : will your Grace compel me to take 
back people who have treated me in this way ? " 

Thereupon the Duke consented to undertake a provisional 
Government, while Mr. Hudson was sent off to Italy in search 
of Sir Robert Peel. He reached Rome in nine days ; at that 
time very quick travelling. " I think you might have made 
the journey in a day less by taking another route," is said 
to have been Peel's only comment upon receiving the Duke's 
letter. He returned at once to England to relieve the tem- 
porary Cabinet, and formed a Ministry in December. The 
same month Parliament was dissolved, and the Conservative 
party went to the country on the policy of " Moderate 
Reform" enunciated in Peel's Tamworth manifesto. "The 
shameful report" referred to by Lady Fanny in the last 
chapter, and immediately contradicted by Lord Minto on 
his return to Scotland, was that he had joined the Peel 
Ministry. 

Thus Lady Fanny came home to find the country-side 
preparing for a mid-winter election. Her uncle, George 
Elliot, was standing for the home constituency against Lord 
John Scott, whom he just succeeded in defeating. In most 
constituencies, however, the Liberals triumphed more easily, 
and when the new Parliament met they were in a majority 
of more than a hundred. In April Lord John Russell carried 



1835-41] LORD MINTO AT ADMIRALTY 23 

his motion for the appropriation of the surplus revenues of 
the Irish Church to general moral and religious purposes, 
so Peel resigned. Melbourne again became Prime Minister, 
and in the autumn of the same year, 1835, Lord Minto was 
appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. 

This meant a great change in Lady Fanny's life ; hence- 
forward for the next eight years more than half of every year 
was spent by her in London. There is a change, too, in the 
spirit of her diaries. Her nature was the reverse of intro- 
spective and melancholy, but at this time she was often 
unhappy and dissatisfied for no definite reason ; her diaries 
show it. It is not likely that others were aware of this private 
distress. She was leading at the time a busy life both at home 
and in society, and there were many things in which she was 
keenly interested. The troubles confided to these private 
pages were not due to compunction for anything she had 
done, nor were they caused by any particular event ; they 
expressed simply a general discontent with herself and a kind 
of Weltschmerz not uncommon in a young and thoughtful 
mind. For the first time she seems glad of outside interests 
because they distract her. 

The months in London were broken by occasional resi- 
dence at Roehampton House and by visits to Bowood. At 
Bowood with the Lansdowne family she was always happy. 
There she heard with delight Tom Moore sing his Irish 
melodies for the first time. There was much, too, in London 
to distract and amuse her : breakfasts with Rogers, luncheons 
at Holland House, and dinner-parties at which all the leading 
Whig politicians were present. But society did not satisfy 
her ; she wanted more natural and more intimate relations 
than social gatherings usually afford. 

London, May 9, 1835 

We went to Miss Berry's in the evening. I thought it very 
tiresome, but was glad to see Lord John Russell and his wife. 

Bowood, December 26, 1835 

The evening was very quiet, there was not much to alarm 
one, and the prettiest music possible to listen to. Mr. Moore 



24 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

singing his own melodies — it was really delightful, and a kind of 
singing I never heard before. He has very little voice, but what 
he has is perfectly sweet, and his real Irish face looks quite 
inspired. The airs were most of them simply beautiful, and many 
of the words equally so. 

January 31, 1836, Admiralty 

I am reading " Ivanhoe " for the first time, and delighted with it, 
but things cannot be as they should be, when I feel that I require 
to forget myself in order to be happy, and that unless I am taken 
up with an interesting book there never, or scarcely ever, is a 
moment of real peace and quiet for my poor weary mind. What 
is it I wish for ? O God, Thou alone canst clearly know — and in 
Thy hands alone is the remedy. Oh let this longing cease ! Turn 
it, O Father, to a worthy object ! Unworthy it must now be, for 
were it after virtue, pure holy virtue, could I not still it ? Dispel 
the mist that dims my eyes, that I may first plainly read the secrets 
of my wretched heart, and then give me, O Almighty God, the 
sincere will to root out all therein that beareth not good fruit. . . . 

February 4, 1836, Admiralty 

The great day of the opening of Parliament. Soon after 
breakfast we prepared to go to the House of Lords — that is to 
say, we made ourselves great figures with feathers and finery. 
The day has been, unfortunately, rainy and cold, and made our 
dress look still more absurd. The King did not come till two, so 
that we had plenty of time to see all the old lords assembling. 
Their robes looked very handsome, and I think His Majesty was 
the least dignified-looking person in the house. I cannot describe 
exactly all that went on. There was nothing impressive, but it 
was very amusing. The poor old man could not see to read his 
speech, and after he had stammered half through it Lord Mel- 
bourne was obliged to hold a candle to him, and he read it over 
again. Lord Melbourne looked very like a Prime Minister, but the 
more I see him and so many good and clever men obliged to do, 
at least in part, the bidding of anyone who happens to be born to 
Royalty, the more I wish that things were otherwise — however, as 
long as it is only in forms that one sees them give him the superi- 
ority one does not much mind. After the debate, several of 
Papa's friends came to dine here. Lord Melbourne, Lord Lans- 
downe. Lord Glenelg, and the Duke of Richmond, who has won 
my heart — they talked very pleasantly. 

March 9, 1836, Admiralty 

I wonder what it is that makes one sometimes like and some- 
times dislike balls, etc. It does not always depend on whom one 



1835-41] ADMIRALTY— ROEHAMPTON 25 

meets. I am sure it is not, as most books and people seem to 
think, from love of admiration that one is fond of them or else 
how should I ever be so, vi^hen it is so impossible for anybody 
ever to admire my looks or think me agreeable ? I sometimes 
wish I was pretty. And I do not think it is a very foolish wish : 
it would give me courage to be agreeable. 

All through this year there are many troubled entries : 

March 28, 1836, Admiralty 

Youth may and ought to have — yes, I see by others that it 
has — pleasures which surpass those of unthinking though lovely 
childhood : but have I experienced them ? . . . What makes 
the same sun seem one day to make all nature bright, 
and the next only to show more plainly the dreariness of the 
landscape? Oh wicked, sinful must be those feelings that 1 make 
me miserable —selfish and sinful — and I cannot reason them away, 
for I do not understand them. Prayer has helped me before now, 
and I trust it will still do so. O Lord, forsake me not — take me 
into Thy own keeping. . . . Mama fifty to-day [March 30, 1836]. 
Oh the feelings that crowd into my heart as if they must burst it 
when I look to this day three years ago. I cannot write or think 
clearly of it yet. I can only feel — but what, I do not myself know 
— at one moment agony, doubts, and fears, as if it was still that 
fearful day ; then joy almost too great to bear. When I think of 
her as she now is, then everything vanishes in one overpowering 
feeling of intense thankfulness. I have several times to-day seen 
her eyes fill with tears — every birthday of those one loves gives 
one a melancholy feeling, and the more rejoicings there are the 
stronger that feeling is. 

^une 27, 1836, Admiralty 

It was decided that we should go to the Duchess of 
Buccleuch's breakfast. My horror of breakfasts is only increased 
by having been to this one, though I believe it was particularly 
pleasant. Certainly the day was perfect, and the sight and the 
music pretty ; but I scarcely ever disliked people more or felt 
more beaten down by shyness. My only thoughts from the 
moment we went in were : How I wish it was over, and how I 
wish nobody would speak to me. 

September 6, 1836, Roehampton 

Mama and I went to dine at Holland House. . . . The rooms 
are just what one would expect from the outside of the handsome 



26 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

old house, with a number of good pictures in the hbrary, where 
we sat, all portraits. Lord Holland is perfectly agreeable, and not 
at all a man to be afraid of, in the common way of speaking, but 
for that very reason I always am afraid of him — much more than 
of her, who does not seem to me agreeable. I was very sorry 
Lord Melbourne did not come, as he would have made the 
conversation more general and agreeable. 

The impression she made on others in her girlhood will be 
seen by this passage in the " Reminiscences of an Idler," 
by Chevalier Wyhoff : " I had the honour of dancing a 
quadrille with Lady Fanny Elliot, the charming daughter 
of the Earl of Minto. Her engaging manners and sweetness 
of disposition were even more winning than her admitted 
beauty." 

In July it was decided that her brother Henry should go 
out to Australia with Sir John Franklin. The idea of parting 
troubled her extremely, and, moreover, the project dashed all 
the castles in the air she had built for him. August 21st was 
the day fixed for his sailing. The 20th came — " dismal, dismal 
day, making things look as if they understood it was his last." 
Long afterwards, whenever she saw the front of Roehampton 
House, where she said good-bye to him, the scene would come 
back to her mind — the waiting carriage and the last farewells. 
The autumn winds had a new significance to her now her 
brother was on the sea. She was troubled too about religious 
problems, but she found it difficult, almost impossible, to talk 
about the thoughts which were occupying her. Writing of 
her cousin Gilbert Elliot, afterwards Dean of Bristol, for 
whom she felt both affection and respect, she says : " In the 
evening Cousin Gilbert talked a great deal, and not only 
usefully but delightfully, about different rehgious sects and 
against the most illiberal Church to which he belongs — but 
how could I be happy ? The more he talked of what I 
wished to hear, the more idiotically shy I felt and the more 
impossible it became to me to ask one of the many questions 
or make one of the many remarks (foolish very likely, 
but what would that have signified ?) which were filling my 
mind." 



1835-41] DEATH OF WILLIAM IV 27 

December 24, 1836, Bowood 

Mr. Moore sang a great deal, and one song quite overcame 
Lady Lansdowne. At dinner I sat between Henry ^ and Miss 
Fazakerlie, who told me that last year she thought me impenetrable. 
How sad it is to appear to every one different from what one is. 

I like both her and Henry better than ever, but oh, I dislike 
myself more than ever — and so does everybody else — almost. Is 
it vain to wish it otherwise ? — no, surely it is not. If my manner is 
so bad must there not be some real fault in me that makes it so, 
and ought I not to pray that it may be corrected ? 

She read a great deal at this time ; Jeremy Taylor, Milton, 
and Wesley, Heber, Isaac Walton, Burnet ; Burns was her 
favourite on her happiest days. She thought that work among 
the poor of London might help her ; but her time was so taken 
up both with looking after the younger children and by society 
that she seems to have got no further than wondering how to 
set about it. 

On June 20th, 1837, William IV died, and in July Parliament 
was dissolved. On the 4th they were back again at Minto. 

Her uncle John Elliot was successful in his candidature of 
Hawick. " Hawick," she writes, " has done her duty well 
indeed — in all ways ; for the sheriff's terrible riots have been 
nothing at all. Some men ducked and the clothes of some 
torn off. We all felt so confused with joy that we did not 
know what to do all the evening." These rejoicings ended 
suddenly : Lady Minto was called to the death-bed of her 
mother, Mrs. Brydone. 

August 19, 1837, Minto 

I feel this time as I always do after a great misfortune, that the 
shock at first is nothing to the quiet grief afterwards, when one 
really begins to understand what has happened. 

I cannot help constantly repeating over and over to myself that 
she is gone, and sometimes I do not know how to bear it and how- 
ever to be comforted for not having seen her once more. 

When the new Queen's Parliament met after the General 
Election the strength of the Conservatives was 315 and of the 
Liberals 342. The Melbourne Ministry was in a weaker 

^ Afterwards Lord Lansdowne and the father of the present Marquis. 



28 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

position ; they could only hold a majority through the support 
of the Radical and Irish groups, and troubles were brewing in 
the country. On the other hand, Peel's position was not an 
easy one ; the split among the Conservatives on Catholic 
Emancipation had left bitterness behind, and in addition to 
this complication, his followers in the Commons included both 
men like Stanley, who had voted for Parliamentary reform, and 
its implacable opponents. But in spite of this flaw in the 
solidarity of the Opposition, the Ministers were far from secure. 
There were the troubles in Canada, which Lord Durham had 
been Sent out to deal with (the Canadian patriots had a great 
deal of Lady Fanny's sympathy), and in England the 
grievances of the poor were in the process of being formulated 
into the famous People's Charter. During the parliamentary 
sessions the Mintos remained in London, with only occasional 
very short absences. 

Admiralty, December 26, 1837 

People all seem pleased with the news from Canada because 
we are beating the poor patriots — let people say what they will I 
must wish them success and pity them with all my heart. 

Eastbourne, April 14, 1838 

It is not only the out of doors pleasures, the sea, the air, etc., 
that we find here, but the way of living takes a weight from one's 
mind, of which one does not know the burden till one leaves 
London and is freed from it. " I love not man the less " from 
feeling as I do the great faults, to us at least, of our London 
society. It is because I love man, because I daily see people 
whose thoughts I long to share and profit by, that I am so disap- 
pointed in being unable to do so. Oh, why, why do people not 
all live in the country — or if towns must be, why must they bring 
stiffness and coldness on everybody ? 

Admiralty, May 10, 1838 

Court Ball. . . . Beautiful ball of beautiful people dancing to 
beautiful music. Queen dancing a great deal, looking very happy. 

Admiralty, ^une 22, 1838 

Evening at a Concert at the Palace — all the good singers. . . . 
All the foreigners there, Soult and the Duke of Wellington shaking 
hands more heartily than any other two people there. 



1835-41] CORONATION OF THE QUEEN 29 

Admiralty, June 28, 1838 

Day ever memorable in the annals of Great Britain ! Day of 
the coronation of Queen Victoria ! . . . We were up at six, and 
Lizzy, Bob'm, and I, being the Abbey party, dressed in all our 
grandeur. The ceremony was much what I expected, but less 
solemn and impressive from the mixture of religion with worldly 
vanities and distinctions. The sight was far more brilliant and 
beautiful than I had supposed it would be. Walked home in our 
fine gowns through the crowd ; found the stand here well filled, 
and were quite in time to see the procession pass back. Nothing 
could be more beautiful, the streets either way being lined with 
the common people, as close as they could stand, and the windows, 
house-tops, balconies, and stands crowded with the better dressed. 
Great cheering when Soult's carriage passed, but really magnificent 
for the Duchess of Kent and the Queen. The carriages splendid. 
Did not feel in the Abbey one quarter of what I felt on the stand. 

MiNTO, November 4, 1838 

This morning brought us the sad, sad news of the death of 
Lady John Russell. God give strength to her poor unhappy 
husband, and watch over his dear little motherless children. 

The only event of importance which occurred in the 
family during 1838 was the marriage of the eldest daughter, 
Mary, to Ralph Abercromby, son of the Speaker and after- 
wards Lord Dunfermline. It was a very happy marriage, but 
Lady Fanny missed her sister very much, and her accounts of 
the wedding and the last days before it are mixed with regrets. 
She speaks of it as " an awful day," though it seems to have 
ended merrily enough in dancing and rejoicings. 

In May, 1839, the Government resigned in consequence of 
the opposition to the Jamaica Bill. The object of the Bill was 
to suspend the constitution of Jamaica for five years, since 
difficulties had been made by the Jamaica Assembly in con- 
nection with the emancipation of slaves. The Radicals voted 
with the Conservatives against the Government and the Bill 
was lost. 

Admiralty, May 7, 1839 

We are all out ! ! ! ! 

Papa was summoned to a Cabinet at twelve this morning. Mama 
and I in the meantime drove to some shops, and when we came 
home found him anxiously expecting us with this overpowering 



30 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

news. We bore, and are still bearing it with tolerable fortitude ; 
but we are all very, very sorry, and every moment find something 
new to regret. Mama, notwithstanding all she has said, is not 
better pleased than the rest of us. Papa looks very grave, or else 
tries to joke it off. 

Friday, May 10, 1839, Admiralty 

Agitating morning — one report following another every hour. 
Sir Robert Peel refused to form a Ministry unless the Queen 
would part with some of her household. To this she would not 
consent. To-day she sent for Lord Melbourne. . . . We went to 
the first Queen's ball, very anxious to see how she and other 
people looked, and to try to foresee coming events by the expres- 
sion of faces. ... I spoke to scarcely one Tory, but our Whig 
friends were in excellent spirits — the Queen also seemed to be so. 

Tuesday, May 14, 1839, Admiralty 

Papa and Bill ^ came from the House of Lords quite delighted 
with Lord Melbourne's speech in explanation of what has passed — 
manner, matter, everything perfect. 

Thus, within the week, the Whig Ministry had resigned 
and accepted office again : this is what had happened. 

On his return from Italy to take office Sir Robert Peel 
requested the Queen to change the ladies of her household, 
and on her refusal to do so, the Melbourne Ministry had come 
in again. Their return to power has been generally considered 
a blunder, from the party point of view ; but their action in 
this case was not the result of tactical calculations. The 
young Queen was strange as yet to the throne, and she could 
not bear to be deprived of her personal friends. When Peel 
made a change in her household the condition of accepting 
office, she turned to the Whigs, who felt they could not desert 
her. " My dear Melbourne," wrote Lord John, " I have seen 
Spencer, who says that we could not have done otherwise than 
we have done as gentlemen, but that our difficulties with the 
Radicals are not diminished. . . ." 

They were, indeed, hard put to it to carry on the Govern- 
ment at all, and they only succeeded in passing their Education 
Bill by a majority of two. 

' Her brother, Lord Melgund, afterwards third Earl of Minto. 



1835-41] THE MINTO FAMILY 31 

On August 12th the Mintos were still kept in London. 
" Oh for the boys and guns and dogs, a heathery moor, and a 
blue Scotch heaven above me ! " she writes. When they did 
get away home, they remained there until the beginning 
of the new year. At home she seems to have been much 
happier. She taught her young brothers and sisters, she 
visited her village friends, and rambled and read a great deal. 
In short, it was Minto ! — all she found so hard to part from 
when marriage took her away. 

Many of the extracts from the diaries quoted in this 
chapter must be read in the light of the reader's own recol- 
lections of the process of getting used to life. They show that 
if Lady Russell afterwards attained a happy confidence in 
action, she was not in youth without experience of bewilder- 
ment and doubts about herself. Following one another 
quickly, these extracts may seem to imply that she was 
gloomy and self-centred during these years ; but that was 
never the impression she made on others. Like many at her 
age, when she wrote in a diary she dwelt most on the feelings 
about which she found it hardest to talk. Her diary was not 
so much the mirror of the days as they passed as the repository 
of her unspoken confidences. " Looked over my journals, 
with reflections," she writes later ; " inclined to burn them 
all. It seems I have only written [on days] when I was not 
happy, which is very wrong — as if I had forgotten to be 
grateful for happy ones." 

Mrs. Drummond, Lord John Russell's stepdaughter (who 
was then Miss Adelaide Lister), has recorded, in a letter to 
Lady Agatha Russell, her recollections of the Minto family at 
that time. 

I think (she writes) my first visit to the Admiralty, where I 
was invited to children's parties, must have been in the winter 
before my mother's death. I have no distinct first im.pressions of the 
grown-up part of the family, except perhaps of your grandmother, 
Lady Minto. Although children exaggerate the age of their elders, 
and seldom appreciate beauty except that of people near their 
own age, I did realize her great good looks. She had very regular 
features and a beautiful skin, with a soft rose-colour in her cheeks. 
Her hair was brown, worn in loops standing out a little from the 



32 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

face, and she always wore a cap or headdress of some kind. Her 
manner was most kind and winning, and she had a pleasant voice. 
I am sure she must have been very even-tempered ; and as I recall 
her image now, and the peace and serenity expressed in her 
beautiful face, I think she must have had a happy life. I never 
saw her otherwise than perfectly kind and gentle and quite un- 
ruffled by the little contretemps, which must have befallen her as 
they do others. With this gentleness there was something that 
made one feel she was capable and reliable, that there was a latent 
strength on which those she loved could lean and be at rest. But 
in speaking of these things I am going far beyond the impressions 
of the small child skipping about the large rooms of the Admiralty. 

There came a time when I not only went to parties and 
theatricals at the Admiralty, but went in the afternoons to play 
with the children. One great game was the ghost game. To the 
delightful shudders produced by this was added some fear of the 
butler's interference, for it took place on the large dining-room 
table. The company was divided into two parties— the ghosts 
and the owners of the haunted house. At four o'clock in the 
afternoon (so as to give plenty of time to pile up the horror) the 
inmates of the house got into bed — that is, on to the table. 
The ghosts then walked solemnly round and round, while at 
intervals one of them imitated the striking of the clock ; as the 
hours advanced the ghosts became more demonstrative and the 
company in bed more terror-stricken, and as the clock struck 
twelve the ghosts jumped on to the table ! Then ensued a fright- 
ful scrimmage with ear-splitting squeals, and the game ended. I 
imagine it was this climax which used to bring the butler. We 
also had the game of giant all over the house. The yells in this 
case sometimes brought Lady Minto on the scene, who was 
always most good-natured. We were quieter when we got into 
mischief ; as when we made a raid on Lord Minto's dressing- 
room, and each ate two or three of his compressed luncheon 
tablets and also helped ourselves to some of his pills. This last 
exploit did rather disturb Lady Minto ; but, as it happens, neither 
luncheons nor pills took any effect on the raiders. 

There were often delightful theatricals at the Admiralty. The 
best of the plays was a little operetta written by your mother, 
called " William and Susan," in which Lotty and Harriet ^ sang 
delightfully in parts ; but this must have been later on than the 
game period. 

I come now to my first distinct impression of your mother. It 
is as clear as a miniature in my mind's eye, and it belongs to 
a very interesting time. I think her engagement to Papa = must 
just have been declared. She came with Lord and Lady Minto. 
to dine with him at 30, Wilton Crescent, the house he owned 

» Lady Harriet Elliot, sister of Lady John Russell. ' Lord John Russell, 




THE COUNTESS OF MINTO, MOTHER OF LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

FROM A MINIATURE BY SIR WILLIAM ROSS. 1851 



1835-41] LADY FANNY ELLIOT 33 

since his marriage to my mother. As she passed out of the room 
to go down to dinner, " Lady Fanny's " face and figure were 
suddenly photographed on my brain. Her dark and beautiful 
smooth hair was most becomingly dressed in two broad plaited 
loops, hanging low on the back of the neck ; the front hair in 
bands according to the prevailing fashion. Her eyes were dark 
and very lustrous. Her face was freckled, but this was not dis- 
figuring, as a rich colour in her cheeks showed itself through 
them. Her neck, shoulders, and arms were most beautifullj' 
white, and her slim upright figure showed to great advantage 
in the neat and simple dress then worn. Hers was of blue and 
silver gauze, the bodice prettily trimmed with folds of the stuff, 
and the sleeves short and rather full. I think she wore an 
enamelled necklet of green and gold. Mama ^ long afterwards 
told me that at this dinner she went through a very embarrassing 
moment ; Papa asked her what wine she would have, and she, 
just saying the first thing that came into her head, replied, " Oh, 
champagne." There was none. Papa was sadly disconcerted, 
and replied humbly, " Will hock do ? " I used to take much 
interest at all times in Papa's dinner-parties, and sometimes 
suggested what I considered suitable guests. I was much dis- 
appointed when I found my selection of Madame Vestris and 
O'Conneli did not altogether commend itself to Papa. 

Mrs. Drummond, in another letter to Lady Agatha Russell, 
alluding to a visit to Minto before Lord John Russell's second 
marriage, writes : 

Mama [then Lady Fanny Elliot] was very kind to me even 
then, and I took to her very much. I used to admire her bright 
eyes and her beautiful and very abundant dark hair, which was 
always exceedingly glossy, and her lovely throat, which was the 
whitest possible — also her sprightly ways, for she was very lively 
and engaging. 

The winter of 1840 was spent between the Admiralty and 
Putney House, which the Mintos had taken. Lady Fanny's 
description of Putney sounds to us now improbably idyllic : 

Out almost till bedtime — the river at night so lovely, so 
calm, still, undisturbed by anything except now and then a slow, 
sleepy-looking barge, gliding so smoothly along as hardly to make 
a ripple. The last few nights we have had a little crescent moon 

' The second Lady John Russell. 



34 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

to add to the beauty. Then the air is so delightfully perfumed 
with azalea, hawthorn, and lilac, and the nightingales sing so 
beautifully on the opposite banks, that it is difficult to come 
in at all. 

Putney House, April 30, 1840 

Finished my beloved " Sir Samuel Romilly." It is a book 
that everybody, especially men, should immediately read and 
meditate upon. 

It was during the summer of this year, 1840, that she began 
to see more of Lord John Russell. She had met him a good 
many times at " rather solemn dinner-parties," and he had 
stayed at Minto. She had known him well enough to feel 
distress and the greatest sympathy for him when his wife 
died, leaving him with two young famihes to look after — ^six 
children in all, varying in age from the eldest Lister girl, who 
was fourteen, to Victoria, his own little daughter, whose birth 
in 1838 was followed in little more than a week by the death 
of her mother. Lord John was nearly forty-eight. Hitherto 
he had been a political hero in her eyes rather than a friend 
of her own ; but, as the following entries in her diary show, 
she began now to realize him from another side. 

yune 3, 1840, Putney House 

Lord John Russell and Miss Lister' came to spend the 
afternoon and dine. All the little Listers came. All very merry. 
Lord John played with us and the children at trap-ball, 
shooting, etc. 

The next time they met was at the Admiralty : " Little 
unexpected Cabinet meeting after dinner. Lords John Russell 
and Palmerston, who talked War with France till bed-time. I 
hope papa tells the truth as to its improbability." Two days 
later she writes : " Lord John Russell again surprised us by 
coming in to tea. How much I like him." The next evening 
she dined at his house ; " Sat between Lord John and Mr. 
E. Villiers. Utterly and for ever disgraced myself. Lords 
John begged me to drink a glass of wine, and I asked for 
champagne when there was none ! " 

^ Miss Harriet Lister was the sister of Lord John's first wife. 



1835-41] LORD J. RUSSELL AT MINTO 35 

On August 13th they left London for Minto : 

We had two places to spare in the carriage, which were taken 
by Lord John Russell and little Tom [his stepson, Lord Ribbles- 
dale]. We had wished it might be so, though I had some fears 
of his being tired of us, and of our being stupefied with shyness. 
This went off more than I expected, and our day's journey was 
very pleasant. 

Minto, August 14, 1840 

Actually here on the second day ! From Hawick we had 
the most lovely moonlight, making the river like silver and 
the fields like snow. Oh Scotland, bonny, bonny Scotland, 
dearest and loveliest of lands ! if ever I love thee less than I do 
now, may I be punished by living far from thee. 

Minto, August 30, 1840 

A great party to Church. Many eyes turned on Lord John 
as we walked from it. He was much amused by the remark of 
one man : " Lord John's a silly ^-looking man, but he's smart, 
too ! " — which he, of course, would have understood as an 
Englishman. In the evening he gave me a poem he had 
composed on the subject of my letter from Lancaster to Mrs. 
Law ' announcing ourselves for the next day. ... In the morning 
[September i] Lord John begged to sit in our sitting-room with 
us. ... I told him the library would be more comfortable, and 
we were established there (he very kindly reading the " Lay " 
aloud), when two Hawick Bailiffs arrived to present him with the 
freedom of the town. . . . After dinner, Miss Lister asked me 
so many questions chiefly relating to marrying, that I began to 
believe that Lord John's great kindness to us all, but especially 
to me, meant something more than I wished. I lay awake, 
wondering, feeling sure, and doubting again. 

Minto, September 2, 1840 

Lord John, Miss Lister, Addy and I went to Melrose Abbey 
and Abbotsford. ... It was his last evening, and in wishing me 
good-bye he said quite enough to make me tell Mama all I 
thought. ... I could see that she was very glad I did not 
like him in that way. I am sure I do in every other. 

Minto, September 3, 1840 

Lord John set off before seven this morning. I dreamed 
about him and waked about him all night. . . . Mama gave me a 

' Delicate. ' Housekeeper. 



Z6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

note from Lord John to me which he had left. ... I wrote my 
answer immediately, begging him not to come back ; but also 
telling him how grateful I feel. Had a long talk and walk with 
Miss Lister, whose great kindness makes it all more painful to me. 

Lady Fanny wrote to her sister, Lady Mary Abercromby : 

A proposal from Lord John Russell is at this moment lying 
before me. I see it lying, and I write to you that it is there, but 
yet I do not believe it, nor shall I ever. . . . Good, kind Miss 
Lister positively worships him. 

MiNTO, September 4, 1840 

Went to the village with Mama and my darling Addy [Lord 
John's stepdaughter], to whom I may show how I love her now 
that he is away. 

MiNTO, September 7, 1840 

Received a very, very sad note from Lord John in answer to 
mine — so kind, but oh ! so sad. 

The note ran as follows : 

September 5, 1840 

Dear Lady Fanny, — You are quite right. I deceived myself, 
not from any fault of yours, but from a deep sense of unhappiness, 
and a foolish notion that you might throw yourself away on a 
person of broken spirits, and worn out by time and trouble. 
There is nothing left to me but constant and laborious attention 
to public business, and a wretched sense of misery, which even 
the children can never long drive away. However, that is my 
duty, and my portion, and I have no right to murmur at what 
no doubt is ordained for some good end. So do not blame 
yourself, and leave me to hope that my life may not be long. 

Yours truly, 

J. Russell 

Miss Lister wrote to Lord John on September 9, 1840 : 

Sad as your letters are, it is still a relief to have them. I will 
hope for you though you cannot for yourself ... I cannot thank 
you as I wish and feel for all you are with regard to the children, 
for all you have been to them. I never can think of it without 
tears of gratitude. . . . You have been more than even an own 
father could have been. And by your example — an example of 
all that is good and pure and great in mind and conduct — you 
are doing for them more than any other teaching can do. 



1835-41] LADY FANNY'S DIARY 37 

For a few days Lady Fanny seems to have felt that the 
matter was irrevocably settled : "The more I think of what 
has happened, the more I bewilder myself — I therefore do not 
think at all." 

But on the following day she writes : "Though I do not 
think, I dream. I dreamt of him last night on some of 
Catherine's bride cake, and that Miss Lister wrote to me of 
him as one whose equal could not be found in the whole 
world." 

Of one thing she was certain, she did not want to leave 
her home : "The west hills looking beautiful as we walked 
round the church. What a pleasure it is to have a church in 
such a situation ! One worships God the better from seeing 
His beauty so displayed around. . . . Walked in the glen and 
wandered about the burn and top of Mama's glen, wondering 
how anybody could ever ask me to leave all that is so much 
too dear. 

"Yesterday [October 23] received a letter from Miss Lister. 
Tells me a great deal about him — the way in which he first 
named me since, and his keeping the book, and much more 
that is very, very touching ; but I will not sentimentalize even 
to my journal, for fear of losing my firmness again." 

Meanwhile, gossip was busy coupling her name with Lord 
John's, and the Press published the rumour. 

Lady Minto to Lady Mary Abercromby 

MiNTO, November 9, 1840 

. . . You will see in the papers the report of Fanny's 
marriage to Lord John Russell. It is very annoying to her, and I 
had a few lines (very touching) from him begging me to have it 
contradicted, which I had already done. If you ask me my reasons 
why, I cannot tell you, but I have a sort of feeling that she will 
marry him still. Gina says certainly not, and neither Lizzy nor I 
think her opinions or feelings changed, but I feel it in my skin ! ! 1 
Still, these feelings are not infallible. . . . Will you tell me if I 
wish it or not ? For I have now thought so much about it I don't 
know my own mind. If I knew that she would not marry at all, 
if she did not marry him, then I should most miserably lament 
that she refused him ; r.but I also know as certainly, that if 
she told me that upon second thoughts she had accepted him, I 



SS LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

should be too unhappy to be able to look as I ought to do. In 
short, dearest Mary, I heartily wish it had never happened. I was 
obliged to tell John [Elliot] of it, as the report was going to be 
made a subject of joking, which would have been very unpleasant 
for Fanny. He was very much surprised, and notwithstanding 
his great dislike to disparity of years, he regretted her refusal 
deeply. He is a great admirer of Lord John's, and was delighted 
with him when he was here. He says that in spite of the draw- 
backs he is clearly of the opinion that she has made a great 
mistake, and hopes that it may take another turn still. You may 
fancy how I am longing to talk to your Father about it. He says 
in his last letter that his eyes were only just opened to Lord John's 
being an old man, when he looked on him in this new light. . . . 

MiNTO, November 15, 1840 

My birthday — it frightens me to be twenty-live. To think how 
days, months, and years have slipped away and how unfulfilled 
resolutions remain to reproach me. Long walk with Papa — talked 
to me about Lord John very kindly. Had a long letter from 
Miss Lister — tells me a good deal about him, and the more I 
hear the more I am forced to admire and like. Then why am I 
so ungrateful ? Oh ! why so obstinate ? I can only hope for the 
sake of my character that Dry den is right that '' Love is not in our 
choice but in our fate." 

At the beginning of the new yea the family moved up to 
London. The next entry, dated from the Admiralty, expressive 
in its brevity, runs : " A surprising number of visitors, one 
very alarming, no less than Lord John — and I saw him." Then, 
a week later, on February 8 : " The agitation of last Monday 
over again. . . . After all, perhaps he only wished to show 
that he is friendly still. It is like his kindness, but he did not 
look merry." 

In March she wrote to her married sister. Lady Mary 
Abercromby, an account of her feelings and perplexities. 

Admiralty, March 16, 1841 

Dearest Mary, — Tho' it is not nearly my day for writing, a 
long letter from you to Mama, principally about myself, has deter- 
mined me to do so — and to do so this minute, while I feel that 
I have courage for the great effort (yes, you may laugh, but it 
is a terrible effort) of saying to you all that you have the best right 
to abuse me for not having said before. If it was really saying. 



1835-41] LETTER TO HER SISTER 39 

oh how happy I should be ! but there is something so terribly dis- 
tinct in one's thoughts as soon as they are on paper, and I have 
longed each day a thousand times to have you by my side to 
help me to read them and to listen to all my nonsense. I felt it 
utterly impossible to write them, altho' I also felt that my silence 
was most unfair upon you and would have made me, in your 
place, either very suspicious or very angry. It has made you sus- 
picious, but now let it only make you angry — as angry as you 
please — for I have itot changed and I do not suppose I ever 
shall. When we first came to town, nothing having taken place 
between us since my positive refusal from Minto, except the 
contradiction sent by us to the report in the papers, Miss Lister 
asked me if I was the same as ever ; and when I said yes, and 
forbade her the subject for the future, she only begged that I 
would see him and allow myself to know him better. I said I 
would do so, provided she was quite sure he was ready to blame 
himself alone for the consequences, which she said he would. 
Accordingly, wherever we met I allowed him to speak to me. I 
begged Lizzy always to join in our talk, if she could, as it made 
me much happier, but this she has not done nearly as much as I 
wished. Whenever I knew we were to meet him, I also took 
care to tell Lizzy that it would be no pleasure to me, and that if it 
was at dinner, I hoped I should not sit next to him. I said these 
things to her oftener than I should naturally have done, because I 
saw that in her wish to disbelieve them she really did so, and I 
wished to make her understand me, in case either Papa or Mama 
or the boys should be speaking of it before her. You will say, why 
did I not speak more to Mama herself ? — partly because I was 
afraid of bringing forward the subject, partly because I knew what 
I had to say would make her sorry, and partly because I was not 
at times so very sure as to have courage to say it must all come to 
an end. However, after a dinner at Lady Holland's last week, when 
he was all the evening by me, I felt I must speak — that it would 
be very wrong to allow it to go on in the same way, and that we 
had no right to expect the world to see hov^r all advances to inti- 
macy, since we came to town, have been made by him in the face 
of a refusal. I do not despise the gossip of the world where there 
is so much foundation for it, and I have felt it very disagreeable to 
know that busy eyes were upon us several times. It must there- 
fore stop, but do not imagine that I have been acting without 
thought. I am perfectly easy about him — I mean that he will 
blame nobody but himself, as I have taken care never to understand 
anything that he has said that he might mean to be particular, and 
the few times that he ventured to approach the subject he spoke 
in so perfectly hopeless and melancholy a way as to satisfy me. 
I am also easy about Miss Lister, as only a week ago she said how 
sorry she was to see that I was happier in society without than 



40 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

with him ; but both he and they must see that it cannot go on so. 
What a stone I am — but it is needless to speak of that. Only 
when I think of all his goodness and excellence, above all his 
goodness in fixing upon me among so many better fitted to him, 
I first wonder and wonder whether he really can be in earnest, 
then reproach myself bitterly for my hardness — and then the 
children : to think of rejecting an opportunity of being so useful — 
or at least of trying to be so ! All these thoughts, turned over and 
over in my mind oftener than I myself knew before we left Minto, 
did make me think that perhaps I had decided rashly. Now do not 
repeat this, dear Mary ; I have said more to you than to anybody 
yet — but I am sorry it is time to stop, I have so much more to say. 
I cannot say how grateful I am to Papa and Mama for leaving me 
so free in all this, and to you for writing. 

Ever your most affectionate sister, 

Fanny 

The day after this letter was written she saw Lord John 
again. " He called and had a long conversation with Mama. 
. . . Mama liked him better than ever." 

Lady Minto to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Admiralty, March 18, 1841 

... I must now return to the subject. I told you of the 
conversation I had with Fanny when she spoke so openly and so 
sensibly of her feelings. . . . She said she was too old to think it 
necessary to be what is called desperately in love, and without 
feeling that his age was an objection or that the disparity was too 
great, yet, she said, if he had been a younger man she would have 
decided long ago. And that is the truth. It is his age alone that 
prevents her at once deciding in his favour. It prevents those 
feelings arising in her mind, without which it would be a struggle 
to accept him, and this she never will do. She was therefore 
desirous that he should know the state of her feelings, that she 
might be again at her ease. He had seen her manner cold to- 
wards him, and wrote to say that he would call upon me yesterday. 
I was horribly frightened, as I hate lovers, and you must allow that 
it was a difficult task to go through. . . . However, he put me so 
completely at my ease by his sensible, open, gentle manner, that 
my task was less difficult than I expected — except that I fell in 
love with him so desperately, he touched my heart so deeply 
that I could scarcely refrain from promising him Fanny whenever 
he chose. There is a depth of feeling and humility about him, and 
a candour and generosity in his judgments, that I never saw so 



1835-41] DEBATE ON FREE TRADE 41 

strongly in anyone before, and every word that he spoke made me 
regret more and more the barrier that prevents him from becoming 
one of us. I said, of course, Fanny's w^ish and ours could only be 
for him to do what he considered best for his own happiness, and 
that half-measures did not answer ; that he now knew the whole 
truth and it was for him to judge how to act. He said then, " I 
cannot have a doubt ; I will visit you less frequently ; I will speak 
very little to you in public, but I cannot, unless you positively 
forbid me, renounce the intimacy now established with your 
family." I said, of course, that it would be a great happiness to 
us all not to lose him, but that I was very doubtful of the wisdom 
of his decision, as it might only be rendering himself more unhappy. 
" That," he said, " is my affair, and I am willing to run the risk." 
. . . Fanny, to whom I told everything, says she is now quite 
happy, and her mind at ease. 

He seems, however, to have made up his mind to keep 
away from them for some weeks. The next mention of him is 
on May 7th, more than a month later : 

Morning visit from Lord John. Said he had a great speech to 
make this evening on sugar. . . . Billy came to dinner full of 
admiration of the speech. Honest, noble, clever. Well, we shall 
go out with honour. 

This speech on sugar was made at a crisis of particular 
difficulty. The debate was the first important discussion in 
Parliament on the new principle of Free Trade. Greville 
describes Lord John's speech as an "extraordinarily good one," 
and Lord Sydenham ^ wrote from Canada : 

I have read your speech upon opening the debate on the sugar 
question with feelings of admiration and pleasure I cannot describe. 
The Free Traders have never been orators since Mr, Pitt in early 
days. We have hammered away with facts and figures and some 
argument, but we could not elevate the subject and excite the 
feelings of the people. At last you, who can do both, have fairly 
undertaken it, and the cause has a champion worthy of it. 

Mr. Baring, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed to 
lower the import duty on foreign and colonial timber and 

' Lord Sydenham said later, " Lord John is the noblest man it has ever 
been my fortune to follow" (Spencer Walpole's "Life of Lord ohn 
Russell"). 



42 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

sugar. Lord John, before the Budget speech, announced his 
intention of moving the House into a committee on the Corn 
Laws. During the course of the eight days' debate he admitted 
that the proposal of the Ministry would be a fixed duty of 8s. a 
quarter on wheat. It was on the occasion of this proposal 
being discussed in the Cabinet that Melbourne, at the close of 
the meeting, made his famous remark, " By the by, there is 
one thing we haven't agreed upon ; what are we to say ? Is it 
to make our corn dearer or cheaper, or to make the price 
steady ? I don't care which ; but we had better all say the 
same thing." 

On June 4th, the very evening Lord John had intended to 
introduce his measure, the Government was just defeated on 
Peel's motion of a want of confidence : " Bill woke me at four 
this morning with the sad words, ' Beaten by one ! Oh dear, 
oh dear ! To expect a triumph and see it won by the enemy. 
Never mind ; our friends deserve success if they cannot 
command it. , . . Party at Lady Palmerston's. He was 
there." 

Four days later her hesitations came to an end, and they 
were engaged to be married. 

Miss Lister wrote to Lord John on June 8th from Windsor 
Castle : 



Oh ! I am happier than I can tell you. God knows you have 
deserved all the good that may come to you, and I always felt it 
must be because of that. I long to be with you and to see her. 
. . . Oh ! I am so happy, but I can scarcely believe it yet. I hope 
Lady Fanny will write and then I think I shall believe it. 

Ever yours affectionately, 

Harriet Lister 

J^une 9, 1841 

Could not write on Monday or Tuesday. Saw him on Monday 
morning ... it was a strange dream all that day and is so still. 
... As soon as he had left me Mama came in. Oh my own 
dearest and best Mama, bless your poor weak but happy child. 
Then I saw Papa. What good it did me to see his face of real 
happiness ! — then my brothers and sisters — I never saw William so 
overcome. 



1835-41] ENGAGED TO LORD J. RUSSELL 43 

Admiralty, June 10, 1841 

Tried to be busy in the morning . . . but nothing would do. 
Must think and be foolish. He came in the afternoon and evening 
— brought me an emerald ring. . . . Miss Lister came — both of us 
stupid from having too much to say, but it was a great pleasure. 
Children here to tea with ours (all but Victoria) and very merry 
and kind to me. Dear precious children. 

Lady Minto to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Admiralty, June 11, 1841 

You must be longing so ardently for post-day that I hate 
to think of the uncomfortable letter this is likely to be ; but 
as Fanny is writing to you herself, my letter will be of less 
consequence. Oh the volumes and volumes I could write and 
long to write and the wee miserable things that I do write ! 
I must at once begin by saying that Fanny's happy face 
would, more than all I can write, convince you how perfectly 
satisfied and proud she is of the position she has put herself 
in ; how it delights her to think of the son-in-law she has 
given to your Father, and the friend she has given your 
brothers. To me he is everything that my proudest wishes 
could have sought out for Fanny. You know as well as me 
that it was not an ordinary person that could suit her ; and it 
really is balm to my heart to see the way in which he treasures 
every word she says, and laughs at the innocence and simplicity of 
her remarks, and looks at her with such pride when he sees her 
keen and eager about the great and interesting events of the day, 
which most girls would neither know nor care about. I don't 
mean that he is absurd in his admiration of her, but it is evident 
how fully he appreciates the singular beauty of her character. In 
short, to sum up all I can say of him, he is in many respects a 
counterpart of herself. She is very open and at her ease with him, 
and I am quite as much at my ease with him as I was with 
Ralph. . . . 

From Lady Mary Abercromby to Lord John Russell 

Genoa, June 19, 1841 

. . . You will every day discover more the great worth of 
what you have won. You cannot have known her long without 
admiring the extreme truth and purity of her mind ; it is sensitive 
to a degree which those with more of worldly experience can 
scarcely understand, yet I feel sure you will watch over it, for it 
has a charm to those who can appreciate it which must make them 
dread to see it disturbed. It is a great privation to me to be so 



44 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1835-41 

little acquainted with you, but believe me I cannot think of you as 
a stranger now that you belong to my dearest Sister, and that I 
look to you for her happiness. If you could think of me as a 
sister and treat me as such it would be a delight to me. 

Admiralty, June 18, 1841 

Very happy day — every day now happier than the one before. 
Oh will it — can it last ? O God, enable me to thank Thee as I 
ought — to live a life of gratitude to Thee. 



CHAPTER III 

1841 

" He served his country well in choosing thee." ^ 

PARLIAMENT had been dissolved soon after Peel's 
motion of a want of confidence had been carried. 
In the election which followed Lord John was returned 
for the City of London on June 30th. 

Admiralty, June 26, 1841 

Day of nomination in the City. He says the show of hands 
was greatly in his favour. . . . Mama says he looked so calm, in 
the midst of the uproar. 

"True dignity is his, his tranquil mind 
Virtue has raised above the things below ! " 

And whether storms may await us in our journey together, even 
to the wreck of all earthly hopes, I know that he will rise superior 
to them — and oh ! to think that I may be by his side to support 
him in adversity as well as to share in his prosperity and 
glorious fate, for which God enable me to be rightly grateful. 

The family moved to Minto before the result was declared ; 
from London Lord John wrote the following letters : 

Lord John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Wilton Crescent, June 25, 1841 
Your letters have filled us all with joy and completed what 
was wanting. I feel very grateful to you for the kindness with 

' From a sonnet to Lady John Russell by Lord Wriothesley Russell, 
written after reading Lady Minto's ballad in which these words occur : 
" His country and thee." 

45 



46 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

which you express yourself. . . . The happiness of possessing 
her has blinded me, I dare say, to her real interest ; but when I 
find that you all approve and feel conscious that I shall do all in 
my power to make her life happy, I gain some confidence. 
Among many anxieties, Lady Minto naturally felt that the charge 
of so many children would be a very serious burthen to her, but 
the children themselves are so good, so much disposed to love 
her, and their health is at present so good, that I trust they will 
be to her as they are to me, a daily comfort, making the house 
cheerful with their merry and affectionate voices. The greatest 
fear perhaps is, that her generosity and devotion to others 
may make her undertake what is beyond her strength. 

Lord John Russell to Lady Fanny Elliot 

Downing Street, July 3, 1841 
If I am sorry that Saturday is come, I am much more glad 
that Tuesday is so near. I am not at all anxious for a merry 
party at Minto — the quieter the better for me. But I can 
understand that Lady Minto would like some gaiety to divert her 
spirits, when " Our dear Fanny " is gone. I cannot say how 
much I think on the prospect of finding you at Minto — and of 
Bowhill likewise. I hope I am not unworthy of the heart you 
gave me . . . and I trust every day will prove how grateful I am 
to you. 

Wilton Crescent, July 4, 1841 
I got your little note yesterday, after I had sealed my letter. 
. . . My dearest Fanny, I am so happy at the thought of being 
soon at Minto. If you believe that I feel the strongest devotion 
to you, and am resolved to do all in my power to make you 
happy, you believe what is true. . . . This will reach you soon 
after your arrival. I can imagine how busy you will be . . . and 
long to join you. 

A few days later he reached Minto himself. Lady Fanny, 
writing to her sister Mary, describes their days together, and 
adds : " They are all except Gibby so much too respectful 
to Lord John. Not to me, for they take their revenge upon 
me, and I am unsparingly laughed at, which is a great 
comfort. I shall write once before it happens. I dare not 
think what I shall be when you receive this." 

Minto, July 19, 1841 

My last day as a child of Minto. How fast it flew. How 
quickly good-night came — that sad, that dreaded good-night. 



1841] MARRIAGE 47 

But sadness may be of such a kind as to give rise to the 
happiest, the purest feeUngs — and such was this. . . . He and 
I sat in the Moss house. Never saw the glen more beautiful ; 
the birch glittering in the sun and waving its feathery 
boughs ; the burn murmuring more gently than usual ; the 
wood-pigeons answering one another from tree to tree. Had 
not courage to be much with Mama. 

They were married on July 20th in the drawing-room 
at Minto, and set off for Bowhill, which had been lent them 
for the honeymoon by the Duke of Buccleuch. Never did 
statesman on his wedding-day take away a bride more 
whole-heartedly resolved to be all a wife can be to him in 
his career. Her mother was now perfectly happy about the 
marriage, though the disparity of age, and fears about the 
great responsibility her daughter was undertaking in the 
care of a young family — one boy and five girls — had 
undoubtedly made her anxious. Lady Minto felt very deeply 
the parting with her dearly-loved child, and after the wedding 
she sent her the following little ballad : 

A BORDER BALLAD 

Air : "Saw ye my father" 

Oh saw ye the robber 

That cam' o'er the border 

To steal bonny Fanny away ? 

She's gane awa' frae me 

And the bonny North Countrie 

And has left me for ever and for aye. 

He cam' na wi' horses, 

He cam' na wi' men, 

Like the bauld English knights langsyne ; 

But he thought that he could fleech 

Wi' his bonny Southron speech 

And wile awa' this lassie o' mine. 

" Gae hame, gae hame 

To your ain countrie. 

Nor come o'er the March for me." 

But sairly did she rue 

When he thought that she spak' true 

And the tear-drop it blinded her e'e. 



48 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

His heart it was sair 

And he lo'ed her mair and mair, 

For her spirit was noble and free ; 

" Oh lassie dear, relent, 

Nor let a heart be rent 

That lives but for its country and thee." 

And did she say him nay ? 

Oh no, he won the day. 

Could an Elliot a Russell disdain ? 

And he's ta'en awa' his bride 

Frae the bonnie Teviot-side, 

And has left me sae eerie alane. 

Oh Where's now the smile 

Used to cheer me ilk morn, 

Like a blink o' the sun's ain light ; 

And where the voice sae sweet 

That aye gar'd my bosom beat 

When sae saftly she bade me gude-night. 

Now lang, lang are the nights 

And dowie are the days 

That sae cheerie were ance for me. 

And oh the thought is sair 

That she'll mine be never mair, 

I'm alane in the North Countrie. 

Mary Minto, July, 1841 

But before following the future, it will be well to look 
back. Lord John himself must play so large a part in a 
biography of his wife that a sketch of his life up to this 
point, and some reminders of the kind of man he was, may 
interest the reader ; not a review of his political achievements, 
but an outline of the events which had left him at his second 
marriage a leader among his countrymen. 

Lord John Russell, born in 1792, was the third son of John, 
sixth Duke of Bedford. He was only nine years old when he 
lost his mother, whom he remembered to the end of his life 
with tender affection. He always spoke gratefully of the 
invariable kindness and affection of his father, who married 
again in 1803, and of his stepmother, but he felt that the 
shyness and reserve which often caused him to be mis- 



1841] LORD JOHN RUSSELL 49 

understood and thought cold were largely due to the loss 
of his mother in his childhood. He was educated at West- 
minster, but he was not robust enough to stand a rough 
life, and it was decidedly rough. His education was con- 
tinued at Woburn under a tutor. He was a book-loving 
boy, and the earliest exercise of his powers was in verses, 
prologues, and plays. Going to the play was one of the 
chief enjoyments of his childhood, and he never lost his 
liking for the drama. Travelling was also a great delight 
to him, either by coach in England or in foreign 
countries, and this enjoyment, with a wonderfully keen 
observation of all that he saw of different places and peoples, 
lasted to old age. 

In 1835 Lord John married Lady Ribblesdale, widow of the 
second Lord Ribblesdale. 

She had by her first husband four children ; one son and 
three daughters.^ After her marriage with Lord John Russell 
she had two daughters, Georgiana Adelaide, born in 1836, and 
Victoria, born in 1838. The marriage had been a most happy 
one, and her death on November i, 1838, was a severe blow 
to Lord John. 

A slight sketch of the more public side of his career will be 
enough here. A visit to Fox in June, 1806, was perhaps the 
first experience which turned his interests and ambitions 
towards politics. All his life he looked up to the memory of 
Fox. There was in Fox an element which made him more 
akin to the Liberals, who succeeded him, than to the old Whig 
party. Lord John, as different from Fox in temperament as 
a man could be, was the inheritor of the spirit which leavened 
the old Whig tradition. In Lord John the sentiments of Fox 
took on a more deliberate air. He was a more intellectual 
man than his lavish, emotional, imposing forbear ; and if it is 
remembered that he had, in addition, the diffidence of a 
sensitive man, these facts go far to explain an apparent 
contradiction in his character which puzzled contemporaries. 
To the observer at a distance there seemed to be two John 

' Lord Ribblesdale, Adelaide Lister (Mrs. Drummond), Isabel Lister 
(Mrs. Warburton), Elizabeth Lister (Lady Melvill). 



50 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

Russells : the man who appeared to stand off coldly from his 
colleagues and backers (he was certainly as incapable as the 
younger Pitt of throwing round him those heartening glances 
of good-fellowship which made the followers of Fox feel like 
a band of brothers) ; and again, the man who, to the rapture 
of adherents, could lift debate at moments to a level where 
passionate principles swept all hesitation away. It was 
surprising to find, in one who commonly wore the air of 
picking his steps with care, the dash and anger of the 
lighter. Bulwer Lytton has described such moments in 
"The New Timon"— 

"When the steam is on, 
And languid Johnny glows to glorious John." 

His speeches, if they had not the animated, flowing reason- 
ableness of Cobden's, resembled them in this, that they 
belonged to that class of oratory which aims at convincing 
the reason rather than at persuading the emotions. Lord 
John had, however, one quality likely to make him widely 
popular — his pluck ; at bay he was formidable. If there was 
a trace of injustice or unreasonableness in his adversaries, > 
though their case might be overwhelmingly plausible, it was 
ten to one he routed them in confusion. He was ready in 
retort. One example of this readiness Gladstone was fond of 
quoting : Sir Francis Burdett had made a speech against 
the Whigs, in which he spoke of the " cant of patriotism." 
"There is one thing worse than the cant of patriotism," 
retorted Lord John, "and that is the recant of patriotism." 
Again, when the Queen once asked him, " Is it true. Lord 
John, that you hold that a subject is justified, in certain cir- 
cumstances, in disobeying his sovereign ? " his answer to this 
difficult question could not have been better : " Well, speaking 
to a sovereign of the House of Hanover, I can only say that I 
suppose he is." 

One more characteristic must be mentioned. Like most 
men scrupulous and slow in determining what to do, his 
confidences often were withheld from others till the last 
moment, and sometimes beyond the moment, when it would 




LORD JOHN RUSSELL 

FROM A PORTKAIT BY G. F. WATTS, R.A. 1852 



1841] LORD JOHN RUSSELL 51 

have been wisest to admit his colleagues to his own counsel. 
In consequence he often appeared disconcertingly abrupt 
in decision. 

In 1808 he accompanied Lord and Lady Holland to Spain 
and Portugal, and on his return he was sent by his father to 
Edinburgh University, the Duke having little confidence in 
the education then procurable at either Oxford or Cambridge. 
At Edinburgh he took part in the proceedings of the Specula- 
tive Society, read essays to them and debated ; and he left the 
University still tending more towards literature than politics. 
There is no doubt that Edinburgh helped to form him. His 
mind was one naturally open to influences which are 
summed up as " the academic spirit " ; disHke of exaggeration, 
impatience with brilliancy which does not illuminate, and 
distrust of enthusiasm which is not prepared to show its 
credentials at every step. His own style is marked by these 
qualities, and in addition by a reminiscence of eighteenth- 
century formality, more likely to please perhaps future than 
present readers ; accurate, a little distant, it pleases because it 
conveys a sense of modesty and dignity. When he speaks of 
himself he does it to perfection. 

After leaving the University he served in the Bedford 
militia. In 1814 he went to Italy, and crossed to Elba, where 
he saw Napoleon. Lord John was always a most authentic 
reporter. His description of the Emperor, written the 
next day, besides its intrinsic interest, is so characteristic of 
the writer himself that it may be quoted here. It is as 
matter-of-fact as one of Wellington's dispatches and as shrewd 
as a passage from one of Horace Walpole's letters. 

Porto Ferrajo, December 25, 1814 ^ 

At eight o'clock in the evening yesterday I went to the Palace 
according to appointment to see Napoleon. After waiting some 
minutes in the ante-room I was introduced by Count Drouet and 

* This account is copied from the old leather-bound journal, in which it 
was written by Lord John the day after the interview ; there is no gap in 
the account, but the last part appears to have been written later, and is 
unfinished. 



52 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

found him standing alone in a small room. He was drest in 
a green coat with a hat in his hand very much as he is painted, 
but excepting this resemblance of dress, I had a very mistaken 
idea of him from his portrait. He appears very short, which is 
partly owing to his being very fat, his hands and legs being quite 
swollen and unwieldy ; this makes him appear awkward and not 
unlike the whole length figures of Gibbon, the historian. Besides 
this, instead of the bold marked countenance that I expected, he 
has fat cheeks and rather a turn-up nose, which, to bring in 
another historian, made the shape of his face resemble the 
portraits of Hume. He has a dusky grey eye, which would 
be called a vicious eye in a horse, and the shape of his mouth 
expresses contempt and derision— his manner is very good- 
natured, and seems studied to put one at one's ease by its 
familiarity ; his smile and laugh are very agreeable — he asks a 
number of questions without object, and often repeats them, a 
habit he has no doubt acquired during fifteen years of supreme 
command — to this I should also attribute the ignorance he seems 
to show at times of the most common facts. When anything that 
he likes is said, he puts his head forward and listens with great 
pleasure, repeating what is said, but when he does not like what 
he hears, he looks away as if unconcerned and changes the 
subject. From this one might conclude that he was open to 
flattery and violent in his temper. 

He began asking me about my family, the allowance my father 
gave me, if I ran into debt, drank, played, etc. 

He asked me if I had been in Spain, and if I was not 
imprisoned by the Inquisition. I told him that I had seen the 
abolition of the Inquisition voted, and of the injudicious manner 
in which it was done. 

He mentioned Infantado, and said, " II n'a point de caractere." 
Ferdinand he said was in the hands of the priests — afterwards he 
said, " Italy is a fine country ; Spain too is a fine country — 
Andalusia and Seville particularly." 

y. R. Yes, but uncultivated. 

A^. Agriculture is neglected because the land is in the hands 
of the Church. 

y. R. And of the Grandees. 

N. Yes, who have privileges contrary to the public prosperity. 

y. R. Yet it would be difficult to remedy the evil. 

N. It might be remedied by dividing property and abolishing 
hurtful privileges, as was done in France. 

y. R. Yes, but the people must be industrious — even if the land 
was given to the people in Spain, they would not make use of it. 

N. lis succomberaient . 

y. /?. Yes, Sire. 

He asked many questions about the Cortes, and when I told 



i84i] INTERVIEW WITH NAPOLEON 53 

him that many of them made good speeches on abstract ques- 
tions, but that they failed when any practical debate on finance 
or war took place, he said, " Oui, faute de I'habitudede gouverner." 
He asked if I had been at Cadiz at the time of the siege, and said 
the French failed there. 

y. R. Cadiz must be very strong. 

N. It is not Cadiz that is strong, it is the Isle of Leon — if 
we could have taken the Isle of Leon, we should have bombarded 
Cadiz, and we did partly, as it was. 

J. R. Yet the Isle of Leon had been fortified with great care 
by General Graham. 

N. Ha — it was he who fought a very brilUant action at 
Barrosa. 

He wondered our officers should go into the Spanish and 
Portuguese service. I said our Government had sent them with 
a view of instructing their armies ; he said that did well with the 
Portuguese, but the Spaniards would not submit to it. He was 
anxious to know if we supported South America, " for," he said, 
" you already are not well with the King of Spain." 

Speaking of Lord Wellington, he said he had heard he was 
a large, strong man, grand chasseur, and asked if he liked Paris. 
I said I should think not, and mentioned Lord Wellington having 
said that he should find himself much at a loss what to do in 
peace time, and I thought scarcely liked anything but war. 

N. La guerre est un grand jeu, une belle occupation. 

He wondered the English should have sent him to Paris — 
" On n'aime pas I'homme par qui on a ete battu. Je n'ai jamais 
envoye a Vienne un homme qui a assiste a la prise de Vienne." 
He asked who was our Minister (Lord Burghersh) at Florence, 
and whether he was honnete homme, " for," he said, " you have two 
kinds of men in England, one of intrigans, the other of hommes 
tres honnetesJ' 

Some time afterwards he said, " Dites moi franchement, votre 
Ministre a Florence est il un homme a se fier ? " 

He had seen something in the papers about sending him 
(Napoleon) to St. Helena, and he probably expected Lord 
Burghersh to kidnap him — he inquired also about his family and 
if it was one of consequence. 

His great anxiety at present seems to be on the subject 
of France. He inquired if I had seen at Florence many 
Englishmen who came from there, and when I mentioned 
Lord Holland, he asked if he thought things went well with the 
Bourbons, and when I answered in the negative he seemed de- 
lighted, and asked if Lord Holland thought they would be able 
to stay there. I said I really could not give an answer. He said 
he had heard that the King of France had taken no notice of those 
Englishmen who had treated him well in England — particularly 



54 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

Lord Buckingham ; he said that was very wrong, for it showed a 
want of gratitude. I told him I supposed the Bourbons were 
afraid to be thought to depend upon the EngHsh. " No," he said, 
" the EngUsh in general are very well received." He asked sneer- 
ingly if the Army was much attached to the Bourbons. 

Talking of the Congress, he said, "There will be no war; the 
Powers will disagree, but they will not go to war " — he said the 
Austrians, he heard, were already much disliked in Italy and even 
at Florence. 

J. R. It is very odd, the Austrian government is hated wher- 
ever it has been established. 

N. It is because they do everything with the baton — the 
Italians all hate to be given over to them. 

y. R. But the Italians will never do anything for themselves — 
they are not united. 

N. True. 

Besides this he talked about the robbers between Rome and 
Florence, and when I said they had increased, he said, *' Oh ! to be 
sure ; I always had them taken by the gendarmerie." 

J. R. It is very odd that in England, where we execute so 
many, we do not prevent crimes. 

N. It is because you have not a gendarmerie. 

He inquired very particularly about the forms of the Vice- 
regal Court in Ireland, the Dames d'honneur, pages, etc. ; in some 
things he was strangely ignorant, as, for instance, asking if my 
father was a peer of Parliament. 

He asked many questions three times over. 

He spoke of the Regent's conduct to the Princess as very 
impolitic, as it shocked the bienseances, by which his father had 
become so popular. 

He said our war with America was a guerre de vengeance, for 
that the frontier could not possibly be of any importance. 

He said, "You English ought to be very well satisfied with the 
end of the war." 

y. R. Yes, but we were nearly ruined in the course of it. 

N. Ha ! le systeme continental, ha — and then he laughed very 
much. 

He asked who was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland at present, but 
made no remark on my answer. 

I asked him if he understood English ; he said that at Paris he 
had had plenty of interpreters, but that he now began to read it 
a little. 

Many English went to Elba about this time ; the substance of 
their conversations is still in my recollection — April 2, 1815. He 
said that he considered the great superiority of England to France 
lay in her aristocracy, that the people were not better, but that 
the Parliament was composed of all the men of property and all 



1841] INTERVIEW WITH NAPOLEON 55 

the men of family in the country ; this enabled the Government 
to resist the shock which the failure of the Duke of York's 
expedition was liable to cause — in France it would have destroyed 
the Government. (This is an opinion rather tinged by the 
Revolution, but it is true that our House of Commons looks to final 
results.) They were strong, he said, by *' les souvenirs attachants 
a I'histoire" ; that on the contrary he could make eighty senates in 
France as good as the present ; that he had intended to create a 
nobility by marrying his generals, whom he accounted as quite 
insignificant, notwithstanding the titles he had given them, to the 
offspring of the old nobility of France. He had reserved a fund 
from the contribution which he levied when he made treaties 
with Austria, Prussia, etc., in order to found these new families. 
" Did you get anything from Russia ? " 

N. No, I never asked anything from her but to shut her ports 
against England. 

He wished, he said, to favour the re-establishment of the old 
families, but every time he touched that chord an alarm was raised, 
and the people trembled as a horse does when he is checked. 

He told the story of the poisoning, and said there was some 
truth in it — he had wished to give opium to two soldiers who had 
got the plague and could not be carried away, rather than leave 
them to be murdered by the Turks, but the physician would not 
consent. He said that after talking the subject over very often he 
had changed his mind on the morality of the measure. He owned 
to shooting the Turks, and said they had broken their capitulation. 
He found great fault with the French Admiral who fought the 
battle of the Nile, and pointed out what he ought to have done, 
but he found most fault with the Admiral who fought — R. Calder — 
for not disabling his fleet, and said that if he could have got the 
Channel clear then, or at any other time, he would have invaded 
England. 

He said the Emperor of Russia was clever and had " idees 
liberales," but was a veritable Grec. At Tilsit, the Emperor of 
Russia, King of Prussia, and N. used to dine together. They 
separated early — the King of Prussia went to bed, and the two 
Emperors met at each other's quarters and talked, often on 
abstract subjects, till late in the night. The King of Prussia a 
mere corporal, and the Emperor of Austria very prejudiced — 
" d'ailleurs honnete homme." 

Berthier quite a pen-and-ink man — but " bon diable qui servit le 
premier, a me temoigner ses regrets, les larmes aux yeux." 

Metternich a man of the world, " courtisan des femmes," 
but too false to be a good statesman — " car en politique il ne faut 
pas etre trop menteur." 

It was his maxim not to displace his Marshals, which he had 
carried to a fault in the case of Marmont, who lost his cannon by 



56 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

treachery, he believed — I forget where. The Army liked him, he 
had rewarded them well. 

Talleyrand had been guilty of such extortion in the peace with 
Austria and with Bavaria that he was complained against by those 
Powers and therefore removed — it was he who advised the war 
with Spain, and prevented N, from seeing the Duke d'Enghien, 
whom he thought a " brave jeune homme," and wished to see. 

He said he had been fairly tried by a military tribunal, and the 
sentence put up in every town in France, according to law. 

Spain ought to have been conquered, and he should have gone 
there himself had not the war with Russia occurred. 

Lord Lauderdale was an English peer, but not of " la plus belle 
race." England will repent of bringing the Russians so far : they 
will deprive her of India. 

If Mr. Fox had lived, he thought he should have made peace — 
praised the noble way in which the negotiation was begun by him. 

The Archduke Charles he did not think a man of great 
abilities. "Tout ce que j'ai publie sur les finances est de 
I'Evangile," he said — he allowed no gaspillage and had an excellent 
treasurer ; owing to this he saved large sums out of his civil list. 

The conscription produced 300,000 men yearly. 

He thought us wrong in taking Belgium from France — he said 
it was now considered as so intimately united that the loss was 
very mortifying. Perhaps it would have been better, he said, to 
divide France — he considered one great advantage to consist as 
I {End of journal.) 

During the session of 1813 Lord John was returned for 
the family borough of Tavistock. He was obliged, however, 
principally owing to ill-health, to retire from active life at the 
end of three years, during which time he made a remarkable 
speech against the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act. It 
must have been at about this time that he thought of giving 
up politics and devoting himself to literature, which brought 
the following " Remonstrance " from his friend Thomas 
Moore : 

REMONSTRANCE 

{After a conversation with Lord John Russell in which he had 
intimated some idea of giving up all political pursuits.) 

What ! thou, with thy genius, thy youth, and thy name — 
Thou, born of a Russell — whose instinct to run 

The accustomed career of thy sires, is the same 
As the eaglet's to soar with his eyes on the sun. 



1841] MOORE'S "REMONSTRANCE" 57 

Whose nobility comes to thee, stamped with a seal, 
Far, far more ennobling than monarch e'er set, 

With the blood of thy race, offered up for the weal 
Of a nation that swears by that martyrdom yet ! 

Shalt thou be faint-hearted and turn from the strife. 
From the mighty arena, where all that is grand, 

And devoted and pure, and adorning in life, 

'Tis for high-thoughted spirits like thine to command ? 

Oh no, never dream it — while good men despair 
Between tyrants and traitors, and timid men bow, 

Never think, for an instant, thy country can spare 
Such a light from her darkening horizon as thou. 

With a spirit as meek as the gentlest of those 

Who in life's sunny valley lie sheltered and warm ; 

Yet bold and heroic as ever yet rose 

To the top cliffs of Fortune and breasted her storm ; 

With an ardour for liberty, fresh as in youth 

It first kindles the bard and gives life to his lyre, 

Yet mellowed even now by that mildness of truth 
Which tempers, but chills not, the patriot fire ; 

With an eloquence — not like those rills from a height. 
Which sparkle and foam, and in vapour are o'er ; 

But a current that works out its way into light 

Through the filtering recesses of thought and of lore. 

Thus gifted, thou never canst sleep in the shade ; 

If the stirrings of Genius, the music of fame, 
And the charms of thy cause have not power to persuade, 

Yet think how to Freedom thou'rt pledged by thy Name. 

Like the boughs of that laurel, by Delphi's decree. 
Set apart for the Fane and its service divine, 

So the branches that spring from the old Russell tree. 
Are by Liberty claimed for the use of her shrine, 

Thomas Moore. 

In spite of strong literary proclivities it would certainly 
have been a wrench to Lord John to leave the stirring scenes 
of Parliamentary life, and his feeling about it may be gathered 
from a letter written to his brother in 1841 : 



58 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841 

Lord John Russell to the Duke of Bedford 

Endsleigh, October 13, 1841 
Whatever may be said about other famiHes, I do not think 
ours ought to retire from active exertion. In all times of popular 
movement the Russells have been on the "forward" side. At the 
Reformation the first Earl of Bedford, in Charles the First's days 
Francis the great Earl, in Charles the Second's William, Lord 
Russell, in later times Francis Duke of Bedford — my father — you 
— and lastly myself in the Reform Bill. 

At the General Election in 1818 Lord John was again 
elected for Tavistock, and began to make the furtherance of 
Parliamentary Reform his particular aim. In 1820 he became 
member for Huntingdonshire. Henceforward, whenever the 
question of Reform came before the House, Lord John was 
recognized as its most prominent supporter. As early as 1822 
he moved that " the present state of representation of the 
people in Parliament requires the most serious consideration 
of the House." In 1828 he succeeded in carrying the repeal 
of the Test and Corporation Acts. He was also an ardent 
supporter of the Catholic Relief Bill. Thus in religious, 
educational, and parliamentary questions he stood up stoutly 
for liberty. When Lord Grey succeeded the Duke of Welling- 
ton, Lord John took a large part in drafting the famous 
measure of Reform, and the Bill of 1831 was introduced by 
him ; after which speech he became the most popular man in 
England. Beaten in Committee, the Reform party appealed to 
the country and returned with a larger majority. On June 24, 

1831, he introduced the Bill for the second time. 

This Bill, after being carried in the House of Commons, 
was rejected by the House of Lords, and it was not till June, 

1832, that the great Reform Bill (the third introduced within 
twelve months) became the law of the land. Lord John, who 
had been admitted to the Cabinet in 1831 during Lord Grey's 
Government, became Home Secretary in Lord Melbourne's 
Government in 1835, and in 1839 he was appointed Colonial 
Secretary, which office he held at the time of his second 
marriage. Up to this point we have only followed his career at 
a distance, but now through the letters and diaries of his wife 
we shall be enabled to follow it more intimately to the end. 



CHAPTER IV 
1841-45 

LORD AND LADY JOHN RUSSELL stayed at Bowhill 
till the 31st of July. They had a grand reception at 
Selkirk on their way back to Minto — a procession headed by 
all the magistrates, a band of music, and banners flying. Lord 
John was given the freedom of the burgh, and was received 
with enthusiasm by the inhabitants. After a short visit to 
Minto they went to London, to his house in Wilton Crescent. 

Bowhill, yuly 29, 1841 

I hardly know how to begin my journal again, I wrote the 
last page as Fanny Elliot ; I am now Fanny Russell. . . . For- 
give me, Almighty Father, for the manifold sins, errors, and 
omissions of my past life, [a life] to which I look back with deep 
gratitude for its countless blessings, especially for the affection of 
those with whom I spent it, so far beyond what I deserved. 
Enable me to think calmly of the Mother whom I have left. . . . 
I was, and still am, in a dream ; but one from which I hope never 
-to wake, which I trust will only grow sweeter as the bitter days of 
parting wear away, as I become more and more the companion 
and friend of him whose heart is mine as truly as mine is his, and 
in whom I see all the strength and goodness that my weak and 
erring nature so much requires. 

This is a perfect place and the days have flown — each walk 
lovelier than the last. Much as poets have sung Ettrick and Yarrow, 
they have not, and cannot, sing enough to satisfy me. ... I am so 
sorry that to-morrow is our last day, though it is to Minto that we go, 
but I feel as if a spell would be broken — a spell of such enchantment. 

Lady J^ohn Russell to Lady Mary Abercromhy 

30, Wilton Crescent, August 13, 1841 
I say nothing of the day we left Minto, which could not help 
being of that kind that one hardly dares to look back to. . . . We 

59 



6o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

were received with great honours at Hawick — bells ringing, flags 
flying, and I should think the whole population assembled to cheer 
us — it is very agreeable that people should be wise enough to see 
his merits, particularly as he does his best to avoid all such 
exhibitions of popular feeling. I like to see his shy looks On such 
occasions, as it gives him less right to abuse me for mine on many 
others. 

Wilton Crescent, August 14, 1841 

We arrived here on Thursday evening. Lord John did 
all he could to make it less strange to me ; but how strange 
it was — and still is. We had a visit from Papa and Henry ; 
my first visitors in my own house. The children arrived from 
Ramsgate all well. Oh, Father in Heaven, strengthen me in the 
path of righteousness that I may be a mother to these dear 
children. 

Wilton Crescent, August 15, 1841 

Dear Baby a great deal with me. She and Georgy call me 
Mama. It was too much — such a mixture of great happiness, 
anxiety, novelty, painful recollections, longing to make him happy — 
impossibility of saying all I so deeply feel from the fear of giving 
him pain. Oh ! I thought I should quite fail. 

Oh, what a weight seemed to be taken off my heart when at 
night, after speaking about the children, he mentioned their 
mother. Now I feel that the greatest bar to perfect confidence 
between us is removed. God bless him for the effort. 

In August, soon after the meeting of Parliament, Lord 
Melbourne's Government was defeated on the Address and 
resigned. 

Wilton Crescent, August 28, 1841 

Lord John dined at Lansdowne House — a last Cabinet dinner. 
. . . Letter from the Queen to Lord John, which for a moment 
overcame him — she does indeed lose a faithful adviser, and deeply 
does he feel it for his country and her. Oh, I never loved him so 
well ; his mind rises with reverse. It is no small matter for a man 
whose whole soul is intent on the good of his country to be stopt 
in his high career — to be, apparently at least, rejected by that 
country — but no, the people are still and will be more and more 
with him, and his career will still be great and glorious. . . . And 
to me he has never shone so brightly as now — so cheerful, so 
calm, so hopeful for the great principles for which he falls — and 
yet, as that moment showed, regretting the event so deeply. 



1841-45] ENDSLEIGH 61 

They went down to stay a few days with the Duke of 
Bedford, and she notes in her diary : 

Continued to like Woburn better and better. Some people 
went and others came, among the last, Lord Melbourne. Lord 
Melbourne did not, I thought, appear to advantage ; he showed 
little wish for conversation with anybody, but seemed trying to 
banish the thoughts of his reverse by talking nonsense with some 
of the ladies. 



The elections which followed the defeat of the Melbourne 
Ministry gave the Tories a majority of over eighty seats. 
Peel was joined by Lord Ripon, Lord Stanley, and others, who 
had supported Lord Grey during the Reform Bill. The Whig 
Party were in a discomfited condition. They did not look 
back on their past term of office with much satisfaction ; they 
had been constantly in a minority ; and although such useful 
measures as Rowland Hill's Penny Postage had been carried, 
nothing had been done to meet the most urgent needs of the 
time. 

The Duke of Bedford had placed Endsleigh at Lord John's 
disposal, and next month he travelled down with Lady John 
to Devonshire. Endsleigh is one of the most beautiful places 
in Devonshire ; it is near the little town of Tavistock, where 
Drake was born. The house looks down from a height on 
the lovely wooded slopes of the River Tamar. In letters to his 
brother Lord John had said of Endsleigh, " It is the place I 
am most fond of in the world." " I think no place so beauti- 
ful for walks and drives." He and Lady John always 
retained the happiest memories of their life there. 

Endsleigh, October 22, 1841 

Long delightful shooting walk with Lord John — delightful 
although so many songs, poems, and sentiments of my greatest 
favourites against shooting were running in my head to strengthen 
the horror that I and all women must have of it. 

" Inhuman man — curse on thy barbarous art." 

Inhuman woman to countenance his barbarity ! 



62 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

Endsleigh, October 26, 1841 

Such a day ! White frost in the morning, sparkling in the 
brightest sun, which shone all day. The trees looking redder and 
yellower from the deep blue sky beyond — the different distances 
of the hills so marked — the river shining like silver. Oh, what a 
day ! We were prepared for it by the beauty of last night — such 
that I could scarcely bring myself to shut my window and go to 
bed. A snow-white mist over all except the garden below my 
eyes and the tops of the hills beyond, and a bright moon " tipping 
with silver every mountain head." 

Endsleigh, November 11, 1841 

With Lord John to hear an examination of the School at Milton 
Abbot. He gave prizes and made a little speech in praise of 
master and boys, which made him and, I think, me more nervous 
than any of the speeches I have heard from him in the House of 
Commons. I do not know why it should have been affecting, but 
it was so. . . . Walk with him in the dusk — his kindness, his 
tenderness are the joy of my life. 

Her marriage had brought her greater happiness than she 
had thought possible. Writing to her mother from Endsleigh 
on November 15th, she says : 

How little I thought on my last birthday how it would be 
before my next. I looked in my journal to see about it and found 
it full of him ; but not exactly as I should write now— reproaching 
myself for not returning the affection of one whose character I 
admired and liked so much. 1 should have been rightly punished 
by his thinking no more about me ; but then, to be sure, I should 
not have known what my loss was. He said a few days ago that 
he hoped it would be a happy birthday — said it as humbly as 
he always speaks of his powers of making me so — yet he must 
know that a brighter could not have dawned upon me, and that he 
is the cause. . . . 

Lord John Russell to Lady Minto 

Endsleigh, November 23, 1841 

Fanny's own letters will have given you the best insight into 
her feelings since we came here. It has been the most fortunate 
thing for us all. Fanny herself, Addy, Georgy, Miss Lister, and 
indeed all of us, have had means of fitting and cementing here, 
which no London or visiting life could have given us. I never can 
be sufficiently grateful for such a blessing as Fanny is to me ; and 



1841-45] CORN LAW DEBATE 63 

I only feel the more grateful that she reconciles herself so well to 
the loss of the home she loved so well. Nor is this by loving you 
or any one she has left at all the less — far from it, every day 
proves her devotion to you and her anxiety for your happiness. 

They could not take a long holiday, although Lord John 
was now in Opposition. Early in February the great Anti- 
Corn Law League bazaar was held at Manchester, and a few 
days later Peel carried his sliding scale : 20s. duty when corn 
was 57s., I2S. when the price was 60s., and is. when it 
reached 73s. Lord John proposed an amendment in favour 
of a fixed duty of 8s. 

Chesham Place,^ February 14, 1842 

Beginning of Corn Law debate. Went to hear Lord John. 
He began — excellent speech — attacked the measure as founded on 
the same bad principle as the present corn laws ; showed the 
absurdity of any corn laws to make us independent of foreign 
countries ; the cruelty of doing nothing to relieve the distress of 
the manufacturing districts ; the different results of a sliding scale 
and a fixed duty ; the advantages of free trade, even with all 
countries, especially with the United States, etc., etc. ; was much 
cheered. Answered by Mr. Gladstone, beside whose wife I was 
sitting. 

Lord John's amendment was lost by 123 votes; Villiers' 
and Brougham's amendments in favour of total repeal by over 
three hundred. This measure of the sliding scale did not 
embody Peel's real conviction at the time ; its object was to 
discover how much the agricultural party would stand. 
Gladstone himself was in favour of a more liberal reduction in 
the sliding scale ; and it appears from his journal that he very 
nearly resigned the Presidency of the Board of Trade in 
consequence of Peel's measure. Peel asked Gladstone to 
reply to Lord John Russell. " This I did," he says, " and 
with all my heart, for I did not yet fully understand the 
vicious operation of the sliding scale on the corn trade, and it 
is hard to see how an eight-shilling duty could even then have 
been maintained." 

^ Lord John had built a house, 37, Chesham Place, which was hence- 
forward their London home. 



64 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

During the next ten months Lord and Lady John were less 
at the mercy of politics than they were destined to be for 
many years to come. They were constantly together, either 
at Chesham Place or at Endsleigh. Lord Minto was living 
near them in London. 

Lord Minto to Lady Mary Ahercromby 

London, March i, 1842 

My dear Mary, — I think you will be glad to have my report 
of Fanny since I have been established almost next door to her, and 
the more so as it will be so favourable. For whatever misgivings 
I may have had from difference of age, or the cares of a ready- 
made nursery of children, have entirely gone off. I really never 
saw anybody more thoroughly or naturally happy, or upon a 
footing of more perfect ease and confidence and equality. I 
forget if you know Lord John well behind the scenes, but there is 
a simplicity and gentleness and purity in his character which is 
quite delightful, and it chimes in very fortunately with Fanny's. 
She has drawn prizes, too, in the children, who are really as nice 
a little tribe as can be imagined, and I reckon myself a good judge 
of such small stock. They are very comfortably housed, much 
better than I ever hope to be in London, and Fanny seems to 
govern her establishment very handily. I don't know that she has 
yet quite brought herself to believe that there is anybody in the 
world so wicked as really to intend to cheat, or to overcharge, or 
to neglect her work for their own pleasure, but I suppose she will 
make this discovery in time. . . . 

Adieu, dearest Mary, I have such a craving to see you again 
that I hardly know how I shall keep myself within bounds on this 
side of the Channel. 

Your affectionate, 

Minto 

Lady Minto to Lord ^ohn Russell 

Minto, March 5, 1842 

You can now be pretty well aware of what my delight will be 
to see my dear Fanny again, and to know her tolerably well ; but 
you have not lived with her five-and-twenty years, and therefore 
memory has no place in your affection for her, and you cannot 
even now comprehend the blank she makes to me. But you can 
well comprehend the extent of my pleasure in reading her letters, 
which breathe happiness in every line, and in hearing from 
everybody of her good looks and cheerfulness. My only fear for 



1841-45] BIRTH OF HER ELDEST SON 65 

her is an anxiety, natural considering the great change, that her 
cares and occupations may weigh at times too heavily upon her, 
and that she will not wish you to see she feels it. This is the only 
thing she would conceal from you ; but as I know the sort of feelings 
she formerly endeavoured to conceal from me, it is but too 
probable she has the same fault still, and nothing but trying to 
extract her feelings from her will cure her, or at least mitigate 
the evil. 

The next great event in their lives was the birth of their 
first-born son, John, afterwards Lord Amberley. 

On the loth of December, 1842, our dear little baby boy was 
born. He has been thriving ever since to our heart's content. 
It has been a happy, happy time to me, and to us all. And now I 
am a mother. Oh, Heavenly Father, enable me to be one indeed 
and to feel that an immortal soul is entrusted to my care. 



On the loth of December, a year later, she expressed the 
same thought in the following lines : 

Rough winter blew thy welcome ; cold on thee 

Looked the cold earth, my snowdrop frail and fair. 
Again that day ; but wintry though it be, 

Come to thy Mother's heart : no frost is there. 
What sparkles in thy dark and guileless eye ? 

Life's joyous dawn alone undimmed by care ! 
Thou gift of God, canst thou then wholly die ? 

Oh no, a soul immortal flashes there ; 
And for that soul now spotless as thy cheek — 

That infant form the Almighty's hand has sealed — 
Oh, there are thoughts a mother ne'er can speak ; 

In midnight's silent prayer alone revealed. 

After Lady John had recovered, they went down to 
Woburn, and later to stay with Lord Clarendon at The 
Grove. At both houses large parties were assembled, and 
Greville notes in his diary that Lord John was in excellent 
spirits. " BuUer goes on as if the only purpose in life was 
to laugh and make others laugh," and he adds, " John Russell 
is always agreeable, both from what he contributes himself and 
his hearty enjoyment of the contributions of others." 



66 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

One of the principal events which had interested Lady 
John in the past year had been the secession from the 
Scottish Church and the estabHshment of the Free Church 
of Scotland. Her feelings about it are expressed in this 
letter to her sister, Lady Mary Abercromby : 

Endsleigh, September 11, 1842 

The divisions in the Kirk distress me so much that I never 
read anything about them now. It is disagreeable to find people 
with whom one cannot agree making use of the most sacred 
expressions on every occasion where their own power or interests 
can be helped by them. You used not to be much of a Kirk 
woman ; but surely you would regret seeing many of her children 
come over to the English. I have just been reading the Thirty- 
nine Articles for the first time in my life, and am therefore 
particularly disposed to prefer all that is simple in matters of 
religion. They may be true ; but whether they are so or not, 
is what neither I, nor those who wrote them, nor the wisest man 
that lives, can judge ; that they are presumptuous in the 
extreme, all who read may see. In short, I hate theology as the 
greatest enemy of true religion, and may therefore leave the 
subject to my betters. ... I need hardly tell you that we are 
leading a happy life, since we are at Endsleigh and alone. Did 
I ever tell you that we are becoming great botanists ? I have 
some hopes of equalling you before we meet, as I feel new light 
breaks upon me every day, and every night too, for I try so hard 
to repress my ardour during the day for fear of being tiresome to 
everybody, that my dreams are of nothing else. John, of course, 
is very little advanced as yet, but he finds it so interesting, to his 
surprise, that I hope even Parliament will not quite drive it out of 
his head. 

Early in February she was back again in London, where 
social and political distractions, together with the care of 
a young family of stepchildren, were soon to prove too much 
for her strength. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

February 7, 1843 

. . . How you must envy me and how I am to be envied for 
having my own people within reach. I am hourly thankful for 
it. . . . Yet for one thing I envy you — great lady as you are, you 
lead a quiet life ; how far from quiet mine is and always must be, 



1841-45] LADY MINTO'S ANXIETY 67 

and how intensely I long that it could be more so, how com- 
pletely worn out both mind and body often feel at the end of a 
common day, none can imagine but those who have become in 
one moment mother of six children, wife of the Leader of the 
House of Commons, and mistress of a house in London. You will 
suppose that I wish husband and children at the world's end, 
and you will call me a sinful, discontented creature ; you will do 
anything but pity me, since my only complaint is that I have not 
as much leisure as so much happiness requires to be enjoyed. 
Well, say and think what you please ; I must let you into my 
secret follies, in the hope of curing myself in so doing. London, 
hateful London, alone is at fault. Anywhere else my duties and 
occupations would be light, and my pleasures would be so not in 
name only. ... How could I beg Mama, as I used to do, to have 
more parties and dinners and balls ! I cannot now conceive the 
state of mind which made me actually wish for such things. Now 
I have them in my power without number, and I detest them all. 
The world has passed its judgment on me. I am reckoned cold, 
dull, and unworthy of such a husband ; and it is quite right, for I 
never appear anything else. In short, I doubt my capacity for 
everything except making husband and children happy — that I 
have not yet begun to doubt. When I do, I will instantly bid 
them all adieu and '' find out some peaceful hermitage." . . . 
Darling Baby was brought in to be seen in his christening dress, 
the gift of Mama, and such a little love you never saw. . . . Papa 
is the best of Grandpapas, as you may imagine from his love of 
babies, and I dehght in seeing him nurse it and speak to it. . . . 

Do not think this quite a mad letter. I wrote as the spirit, 
good or evil, prompted me. I must do so or not write at all. . . . 

Ever, my dearest Mary, your most affectionate sister. 

Lady Minto was evidently afraid that her daughter was 
shutting herself up too entirely with her family, and not 
amusing herself as much as was good for her. 

" My dearest Mama," she answers (on July 5, 1843) — 

... I hope to make you laugh at yourself for your fears about 
me, and to convince you that the seclusion of Belgravia, though 
great, is not quite like that of Kamschatka ; that John's pleasure is 
not my pleasure, that the welfare of the children is not my 
happiness, and that far from constantly devoting my time to them, 
one whole afternoon this week was devoted to the world and the 
fine arts in Westminster Hall. I will name to you a few of the 
friends I met there, by all of whom I was recognized, in spite 
of my long banishment, my wrinkles, and my grey hair. . . . 
[Thirty names follow.] 



68 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

The evening before I had been without John to a tea at Mr. 
W. Russell's. To-night we are to dine with the Duke and 
Duchess of Buccleuch ; to-morrow to breakfast with the Duchess 
Dowager of Bedford ; on Thursday go to the Drawing-room and 
give our banquet ; and so on to the end of the session and season. 
Seriously, dear Mama, if I had more of the pleasures of my age, 
I should dislike them very much ; those of a more tender age 
suit me better ; and if you do not think it unbecoming, I will have 
a swing and a rocking-horse in our own garden. You ought 
rather to scold Papa for shutting himself up ; he has seen hardly 
anybody but ourselves, which has been very agreeable for us — 
so agreeable that I do not at all like his going away, tho" of 
course I do not try to keep him longer when he so much wishes 
to go, and you so much wish to have him. . . . 

You think I did not know what I was undertaking when we 
married, and you are right. The hope, humble as it was, of 
lightening the duties and cheering the life of one — the wish, God 
knows how sincere, of being a mother to those who had none, 
outweighed all other considerations. But if I did not know and 
have sometimes been overpowered by the greatness of my duties, 
if I have sighed for the repose and leisure with which marriage 
generally begins, neither did I know the greatness of my 
rewards — so far beyond what I deserve. The constant sympathy, 
encouragement, and approbation of John can make everjrthing 
easy to me ; and these I trust I shall always have ; these will keep 
me young and merry, so do not distress yourself about me, my 
own dear Mama, and believe me ever your most affectionate 
child, 

Fanny Russell 

The year 1843 was one of increasing difficulty for the 
Tories. Peel's followers began to suspect more and more 
strongly that he was not sound on the question of the corn 
taxes ; outside Parliament, Cobden and Bright were battering 
Protection at their great monthly meetings in Covent Garden 
Theatre. The troubles in Ireland were growing acute, and the 
arrest of O'Connell and the Repeal leaders made matters worse. 
The Government had been forced to abandon their Bill for the 
education of factory children through the bitter opposition of 
Dissenters and Radicals, who thought the Bill increased the 
already too great influence of the Church. At the beginning 
of the year the Government had been strong enough to throw 
out Lord Howick's motion for a committee of inquiry into the 
causes of distress, which would have entailed a division upon 



1841-45] LORD JOHN AND O'CONNELL 69 

the Corn Laws ; but the strength of the Ministry was now 
seriously diminished. ParHament was prorogued late in 
August ; on the 5th Lord John left London, hoping that he 
had done with politics till next year. The whole family moved 
down to Endsleigh, where, soon afterwards, his eldest step- 
daughter fell ill of a fever. 

Lady John caught the infection. She had been living up 
to the limit of her energies, and her case proved a grave one. 
They moved to Minto in October, and never again used 
Endsleigh as their country house. By the beginning of 1844 
she was sufficiently recovered to attend the House of Commons 
and to hear her husband speak upon the Irish question. In 
this speech he declared himself in favour of putting Catholics, 
Anglicans, and Dissenters on an equality ; not by disestablish- 
ing the English Church in Ireland, but by endowing the 
Catholics. He summed up the political situation by saying : 
" In England the government, as it should be, is a government 
of opinion ; the government of Ireland is notoriously a 
government by force." 

February 15, 1844 

O'Connell arrived from Dublin — much cheered by the crowd 
outside and by the Irish and Radical members inside the House. 
John shook hands with him. O'Connell said : '' I thank you for 
your admirable speech. It makes up to us for much that we have 
gone through." 

Lady John's next Diary was lost, and the first entry in 
her new Diary was written after serious illness. 

London, February 2, 1845 

I have found in illness even more than in health how much 
better I am loved than I deserve to be. To say nothing of the 
unwearied care and cheerful watching of my dearest John, the 
children have given me such proofs of affection as gladdened many 
an hour of pain or weariness. One day, while I was ill in bed, and 
Georgy by me, I told her how kind it was of God to send illness 
upon us at times, as warnings to repent of past faults and prepare 
for death. Upon which she said : " But, Mama, you can't have 
done anything to be sorry for." No self-examination, no sermon, 
could have made me feel more humble than these words of a little 
child. 



70 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

During the early part of the year, while Lord John was 
supporting in the House of Commons the endowment of the 
Maynooth College for priests and the establishment of colleges 
in other important Irish towns, Lady John was living at 
Unsted Wood, near Godalming, a house they had taken for 
the year. 

Their constant separation was painful to both, and as soon 
as Parliament rose they decided to go to Minto. There the 
state of her health became so alarming that, to be within reach 
of medical advice, they moved to Edinburgh. 

The distress of the poorer classes throughout the country 
during this autumn was terrible. It was to meet this distress, 
unparalleled since the Middle Ages, that Lord John wrote from 
Edinburgh his famous Free Trade letter to his London con- 
stituents, urging them to clamour for the only remedy, "to 
unite to put an end to a system which has proved to be the 
blight of commerce, the bane of agriculture, the source of 
bitter divisions among classes, the cause of penury, fever, 
mortality, and crime among the people." 

Shortly afterwards he was called to London by the sudden 
death of his old friend Lady Holland, and he had hardly 
returned when the news of Peel's resignation reached him. 
Peel, thoroughly alarmed, had called a Cabinet Council to 
consider the repeal of the Corn Laws. Lord Stanley, after- 
wards Lord Derby, had strongly dissented, and carried several 
Ministers with him, thus compelling Peel to resign. 

Lady ^ohn Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Edinburgh, December 2, 1845 

I wonder what Ralph and William will say to John's letter to 
his electors. It is what I have long wished, and I am delighted 
that the chief barrier between him and the Radical part of the Whig 
party shovild be knocked down by it. In short, patriotically I am 
quite pleased, but privately far from it ; I dread its being a stepping- 
stone to office, which, not to mention myself, would kill him very 
soon. He has already quite as much work as his health can stand, 
so what would it be with office in addition ? However, I do not 
torment myself with a future which may never come, or which, if 
it does, I may never see. I forget whether I have written since 



1841-45] LORD JOHN AT OSBORNE 71 

poor Lady Holland's death, which John felt very much. It is sad 
that her death should have startled one as only that of a young 
person generally does ; but, old as she was, she never appeared so, 
and she belonged as much to society as she ever did. Poor woman, 
it is a comfort that she died so calmly, whatever it was that enabled 
her to do so. 

Lord John had hardly returned to Edinburgh when the 
event which she had been trying to think remote and unlikely 
was upon them. 

Edinburgh, December 8, 1845 

Evening of utter consternation. A message from the Queen 
requiring John's attendance at Osborne House immediately. . . . 
John set out at ten this morning (December 9th) on his dreary and 
anxious journey, leaving a dreary and anxious wife behind him. 
Baby not well towards evening. Sent for Dr. Davidson. Oh, 
Heavenly Father, preserve to me my earthly treasures, and what- 
ever be my lot in life, they will make it a happy one. Forgive me 
for such a prayer. The hope of happiness is too strong within me. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

London, December 10, 1845 

It is very sad, this moment, when many will think me at the 
height of my ambition. But when I think of you and your many 
trials, and the children with their ailments to disturb you, when 
I cannot share your anxieties — it is all very sad. I doubt, too, of 
the will of the country to go through with it — and then I shall 
have done mischief by calling upon them. I saw Mr, Bright at 
one of the stations. He spoke much of the enthusiasm. God 
save and preserve us all. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Osborne House, December 11, 1845 

Well, I am here — and have seen Her Majesty. It is proposed 
to me to form a Government, and nothing can be more gracious 
than the manner in which this has been done. Likewise Sir 
Robert Peel has placed his views on paper, and they are such 
as very much to facilitate my task. Can I do so wild a thing ? 
For this purpose, and to know whether it is wild or not, I must 
consult my friends. . . . There end politics — I hope you have 
not suffered from anxiety and the desolation of our domestic 
prospects. ... I stay here to-night, and summon my friends in 
London to-morrow — Ever, ever affly., with love to all, 

J.R. 



72 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

Lady Joh to Lord Joh Russell 

Edinburgh, December 13, 1845 

I have just read your note which I so anxiously expected from 
Osborne House. No, my dearest, it is not a wild thing. It is a 
great duty which you will nobly perform ; and, with all my 
regrets — with the conviction that private happiness to the degree 
we have enjoyed is at an end if you are Prime Minister — still 
I sincerely hope that no timid friend will dissuade you from at 
least trying what you have yourself called upon the country to 
help you in. If I liked it better, I should feel less certain it was 
a duty. If you had not written that letter you might perhaps 
have made an honourable escape ; but now I see none. 

She wrote again on the 14th : 

I am as eager and anxious lying here on my sofa— a broken- 
down, useless bit of rubbish — as if I were well and strong and in 
the midst of the turmoil. And I am proud to find that even the 
prospect of what you too truly call the *' desolation of our 
domestic prospects," though the words go to my very heart 
of hearts, cannot shake my wish that you should make the 
attempt. My mind is made up. . . . My ambition is that you 
should be the head of the most moral and religious government 
the country has ever had. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercroniby 

Edinburgh, December 14, 1845 

Dearest Mary, — All you say of your dreams for me in days 
gone by is like yourself. You were always thinking more of my 
happiness than your own. What a strange world it is, where the 
happiest and saddest events are so often linked together — for 
instance, the marriage and absence of those one would wish to have 
always by one. I certainly never wish either of our marriages 
undone ; but " Seas between us braid hae roared sin auld Lang- 
syne " more than either of us could have borne to look forward to. 
If ever I did wish myself freed from my husband, it has been for 
the last five days, since the highest honour in the land has been 
within his reach. Oh dear ! how unworthy I am of what to many 
wives would be a source of constant pride, not only for their 
husband's sake, but their own ; whereas, proud as I am of so 
public a mark of his country's good opinion, and convinced as 
I am that he ought not to shrink from the post, still to myself it is 
all loss, all sacrifice — every favourite plan upset — London, Lon- 



1841-45] LETTER FROM MACAULAY t^- 

don, London, and London in its worst shape — a constant struggle 
between husband and children, constant anxiety about his health 
and theirs, added to that about public affairs. But I will not begin 
to count up the countless miseries of office to those who have, I 
will not say a love, but a passion for quiet, leisure, and the country. 

As I said before, I am so convinced that he ought to make the 
trial, unless the difficulties are much greater than I have wisdom 
to see, that I should be positively disappointed if I found he had 
given it up. 

Besides, I see many bright sides to it all. You will think 
I have lost all my old patriotism, but it is not so ; and the 
prospect of seeing my husband repeal the Corn Laws, and pacify 
and settle Ireland, is one that repays me for much private regret. 
You see, if he does undertake to govern, I expect him to do 
it successfully, and this in spite of many a wise friend. He wer*" 
off looking so miserable himself that I long to hear from some- 
body else how he looks now. You cannot think what a thunder- 
bolt it was to us both. We were reading aloud, about an hour 
before bedtime, when the messenger was announced — and he 
brought the Queen's fatal letter. Oh ! how difficult I found it 
not to call the man every sort of name ! The next morning John 
was off, and though he flattered himself he would be able to come 
back to me in any case, / flatter myself no such thing. 

Poor baby made his resolution falter that morning — he would 
not leave him for a moment, clinging round his neck and laying 
his little cheek on his, coaxing him in every possible way. He 
does not conceal either from himself or me how entire the 
sacrifice must be of private happiness to public duty, of which 
this parting was the first sample ; and he writes of the desolation 
of domestic prospects in so sad a way that I am obliged to write 
like a Spartan to him. 

What her feelings were at this time the above letter shows. 
What was happening in London may be gathered from Lord 
John's letters and the following letter from Macaulay to his 
sister: ^ **. . . Lord John has not consented to form a Ministry. 
He has only told the Queen that he would consult his friends, 
and see what could be done. We are all most unwilling to 
take office, and so is he. I have never seen his natural audacity 
of spirit so much tempered by discretion, and by a sense of 
responsibility, as on this occasion. The question of the Corn 
Laws throws all other questions into the shade. Yet, even 
if that question were out of the way, there would be matters 

' Trevelyan's " Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay." 



74 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

enough to perplex us. Ireland, we fear, is on the brink of 
something like a civil war — the effect, not of Repeal agitation, 
but of severe distress endured by the peasantry. Foreign 
Politics look dark. An augmentation of the Army will be 
necessary. Pretty legacies to leave to a Ministry which will 
be in a minority in both Houses. I have no doubt that there 
is not a single man among us who would not at once refuse 
to enlist, if he could do so with a clear conscience. Neverthe- 
less, our opinion is that, if we have reasonable hope of being 
able to settle the all-important question of the Corn Laws in 
a satisfactory way, we ought, at whatever sacrifice of quiet 
and comfort, to take office, though only for a few weeks. But 
can we entertain such a hope ? This is the point ; and till 
we are satisfied about it we cannot positively accept or refuse. 
A few days must pass before we are able to decide. 

"It is clear that we cannot win the battle with our own 
unassisted strength. If we win it at all, it must be by the help 
of Peel, Graham, and their friends. Peel has not seen Lord 
John; but he left with the Queen a memorandum, containing 
a promise to support a Corn Bill founded on the principles of 
Lord John's famous letter to the electors of London." 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, December 14, 1845 

Well, my friends agreed with me that, unless I could have a 
very good prospect of carrying a grand measure about corn, I had 
better decline the Queen's Commission. So we are to have all the 
old Cabinet men here on Tuesday, and try to ascertain whether 
we are agreed on a measure, and whether Sir Robert Peel would 
support such a measure as we should propose. On Wednesday 
evening, or Thursday, I hope the matter will be cleared up, and if 
you ask me what I think, I should say it is most probable that we 
shall be made into a Ministry. How very strange and incompre- 
hensible it seems ; and much as I have had to do with public 
affairs, I feel now as if I knew nothing about them, and was 
quite incompetent to so great an office — to rule over such vast 
concerns, with such parties. With so many great things and so 
many little things to decide it is quite appalling. 

Many of our friends say I ought to decline ; but I feel that to 
do so would be mean and dastardly while I have a prospect of 
such great good before me — possible if not probable, but I think 



1841-45] SUSPENSE 75 

even probable. It would seem that most of the Cabinet thought 
I should have a better chance of preventing bitter attacks than 
Peel would. This may be so, or not. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, December 17, 1845 
I want a security that I shall be able to carry a total repeal of 
the Corn Laws without delay, and that security must consist in an 
assurance of Sir Robert Peel's support. Unless I get this, I give 
up the task. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

MiNTO, Sunday, December 21, 1845 
It is difficult to write while our suspense lasts. ... It does not 
seem unlikely that Lord Grey^ will have yielded, and all be smooth, 
or smoother, again. Papa tells me not to wish it even on public 
grounds. On private ones I certainly do not ; but I should be 
ashamed if at such a time my anxieties were not chiefly for you as 
a statesman, not as my husband, and for my country more than 
for myself. If it turns out that the interests of the statesman and 
the country and the wife agree, why then let us be thankful ; if 
not, why then let us be thankful still that we can make some 
sacrifice to duty. You see that my " courage mounteth with 
occasion " ; and though I have low and gloomy fits when I think 
of my ill-health and its probable consequences, I am sure that, 
on the whole, I shall not disgrace you. Oh, what a week of toil 
and trouble you have had, and how gladly I would have shared 
them with you to more purpose than I can do at this terrible 
distance. ... It is so pleasant to write to you. When I have 
finished my letter I always grow sad, as if I was really saying 
good-bye to you. How have you been sleeping ? and eating ? and 
have you walked every day ? . . . Good-bye, Heaven bless you, 
my dearest love. I trust that this has been a day of rest to you, 
and that God hears and accepts our prayers for one another. 

Lord John wrote daily to his wife, and the following three 
letters to her show what he felt during this anxious time : 

Chesham Place, December 19, 1845 
It is all at an end. Howick [Lord Grey] would not serve with 
Lord Palmerston as Foreign Secretary, and it was impossible for 
me to go on unless I had both. I am very happy ... at the 
result. I think that for the present it will tend much to our 
happiness ; and power may come, some day or other, in a less 
odious shape. 

' Third Eari Grey, son of the Prime Minister. 



16 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1841-45 

Chesham Place, December 20, 1845 

I write to you with a great sense of relief on public affairs. 
Lord Grey's objection to sitting in a Cabinet in which Palmerston 
was to have the Foreign Office was invincible. I could not make 
a Cabinet without Lord Grey, and I have therefore been to 
Windsor this morning to resign my hard task. The Queen, as 
usual, was very gracious. ... I have left a paper with her in 
which I state that we were prepared to advise free trade in corn 
without gradation and without delay ; but that I could support 
Sir Robert Peel in any measure which he should think more 
practicable. 

Chesham Place, December 21, 1845 

The desponding tone of your letter, yesterday, although I do 
not believe it was otherwise than the effect of weakness, makes 
me rejoice at my escape a thousand times more than I should 
otherwise have done. I reflect on the misery I should have felt 
with every moment of my time occupied here in details of 
appointments, while my thoughts were with you. . . . The Queen 
and the Prince have behaved beautifully throughout. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

MiNTO, December 24, 1845 

You will not be surprised that a great deal of the time which 
I meant to devote to you this morning has run away in talk to 
my husband. You will see by the Times what the caiLse of the 
failure is : Lord Grey's refusal to belong to the Ministry if Lord 
Palmerston was at the Foreign Office — a most unfortunate cause, 
we must all agree, but in the opinion of Papa and many other 
wise people, a most fortunate occurrence on the whole, as they 
considered it next to impossible that such a Ministry as John 
could have formed would have been strong enough to be of 
use to the country. 

My husband, who is no coward, sees it differently, and thinks 
that with a united Cabinet he might have gone on successfully 
and carried not only Corn Law Repeal, but other great questions ; 
though the probability was that they would only have carried 
that and then gone out. But even that would have been some- 
thing worth doing, and better and more naturally done by Whigs 
than Tories. One good thing is that John has returned in 
excellent spirits. All his personal wishes and feelings were so 
against taking office at present, and the foretaste he had of it in 
this lonely and most harassing fortnight was so odious to him 
that his only feeling at first when he gave it all up was pure 
delight ; and he slept, which he had not been able to do before. 



1841-45] REFORM AND FREE TRADE j^ 

It certainly was a terrible prospect to us both — one immovable 

in Edinburgh, the other equally immovable in London — and it 
required all my patriotism to wish the thing to go on. 

If it had gone on, the name of Lord John Russell would be 
now more often on men's lips. Peel's popular fame rests upon 
the abolition of the Corn Laws, Lord John's upon the first 
Reform Bill. It was but an accident — Lord Grey's objection 
to Palmerston at the Foreign Office — which prevented the 
name of Lord John Russell from being linked with those of 
Cobden and Bright, and imperishably associated with both 
the great measures of the nineteenth century. 



CHAPTER V 

1846 

AFTER Lord John's failure to form a Ministry, Peel 
returned to power ; Gladstone replaced Stanley at 
the War and Colonial Office, and Stanley became the 
acknowledged leader of the protectionist Opposition. Having 
Lord John's assurance that the Whigs would support anti- 
Corn Law legislation, Peel set about preparing his famous 
measure. But before it could be discussed in Parliament, 
the usual explanations with regard to resignation and resump- 
tion of office had to be gone through. In his speech on this 
occasion, Lord John tried to shield Lord Grey as far as 
possible from the unpopularity which he had incurred by 
refusing to work with Palmerston in the same Cabinet. 
Feeling on both sides of the House was against Lord Grey ; 
for both Free Traders and Protectionists thought that Repeal 
ought to have come from the Whigs, and that it was Lord 
Grey who had made this impossible. 

Lady John remained in Edinburgh, too ill to move. While 
her husband was helping Peel at Westminster, the following 
letters passed between them : 

Lord yohn to Lady John Russell 

London, January 23, 1846 

I did not write to you last night, as I thought I could give 
you a clearer account to-day. Sir Robert Peel gave up Protection 
altogether on the ground that he had changed his opinion. . . . 
I dine with the Fox Club [to-day ?J and at Lansdowne House 
to-morrow. I have rather startled Lord Lansdowne this morning 
by some of my views about Ireland. 



1846] ILLNESS IN EDINBURGH 79 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, January 25, 1846 

I never doubted that you were as noble by nature as by name ; 
and I am now more happily convinced of it than ever. Your 
whole speech was plain and excellent, but the part that I dwell 
upon with the greatest pleasure is that about Lord Grey. . . . 
I generally think your speeches a curious contrast to Sir Robert's, 
and it does not fail on this occasion. His humble confession of 
former errors, his appeal to our sympathies, and his heroic tone 
at the close, all got rather the better of my reason while I read ; 
but the more I think over his conduct, the less becomes the effect 
of his words. Yours, on the contrary, as usual, only gain in force 
the more they are reflected on, simply because they are true. 
And now, having congratulated you quite as much as is good 
for your vanity, I must praise myself a little for the way in which 
I have hitherto borne your absence. What with its present pain, 
the uncertainty as to when it may end, and my varying and 
wearying state of health, I have many a time been inclined to lie 
and cry ; and if ever I allowed myself to dwell in thought on 
the happy days which sad memory brings to light, I should lie and 
cry ; those days when neither night nor day could take me from 
your side, and when it was as difficult to look forward to sickness 
or sorrow as it now is to believe that health and happiness — 
such happiness as that — are in store for us. But I do not dwell 
upon past enjoyments, but upon present blessings, and I do lie and 
talk and read and write and think cheerfully and gratefully. 

Dearest, I know you cannot see much of the children, but when 
you do, pray be both Papa and Mama to them. Do not let 
their little minds grow reserved towards you, or your great mind 
towards them. Help them to apply what they hear you read 
from the Bible to their own little daily pleasures and cares, and 
you will find how delightfully they take it all in. 

God bless you, my dearest. Pray go out every day, and take 
Isabel and Bessy or one of the small ones with you sometimes to 
enliven you. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, January 26, 1846 

Your mention of the dreams which you had had of happiness 
for Ireland made me sad, and you know how I shared in those 
dreams. ... I like the way in which politics are talked here — it 
is far enough from the scene of action for them to lose much of 
their personality, and for all the little views to be lost in the 
greater — and yet the interest is as great as in London. 



8o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromhy 

Edinburgh, January 28, 1846 

Well, I wonder what you will say to the debate or rather the 
explanations in Parliament. Are not John's and Sir Robert's 
speeches a curious contrast ? and is not John a generous man ? and 
is not Sir Robert a puzzling one ? and was there ever such a 
strange state of parties ? What an unhappy being a real Tory 
must be, at least in England, battling so vainly against time and 
tide, and doomed to see the idols of his worship crumbled to dust 
one after another. In your benighted country [Italy] their end is 
further off ; but still it must come. I am reading a book on 
Russia that makes my blood boil at every page. It is called 
" Eastern Europe and the Emperor Nicholas," and I am positively 
ashamed of the reception we gave that wholesale murderer in our 
free country. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, February i, 1846 

The Ministry will carry their Corn Measure, but v/ill hardly last 
a month after it. What next ? I think the next Government will 
be Whig, as the Protection party have no corps of officers in the 
House of Commons. So that their only way of avenging them- 
selves upon Peel is to bring in a Liberal Ministry. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

MiNTO, February 7, 1846 

I am glad you have a satisfactory letter from the doctor. A 
volunteered letter from him, as this was, must be a good sign. . . . 
I shall all my life regret not having been with you at this most 
interesting period in our political history ; for the longest letters 
can but barely make up for the loss of the hourly chats upon each 
event with all its variations which are only known in London. 
Then, I think how sad it is for you to have nobody to care, as I 
should care, whether you had spoken well or ill. But all this and 
much more we must bear as cheerfully as we can ,• and I am glad 
to think that though one wife is far from you, your other wife, 
the House of Commons, leaves you little time to spend in pining 
for her. I think you quite right in your intention of voting for Sir 
Robert's measure as it is, in preference to any amendment which 
would not be carried, and might delay the settlement of the 
question. Not, as you well know, because I am not heart and 
soul a Free Trader, but because I think it a more patriotic, as well 
as a more consistent, course for you to take. Then if you come 



1846] IRELAND AND THE CORN LAWS 81 

into o£&ce, as seems probable, you may make what improvements 
you like, and especially put an end to the miserable trifling about 
slave-grown sugar ; a question in which I take a sentimental 
interest, as your first gift to me was your great sugar speech 
in 1841. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

House of Commons, February 9, 1846 

Here I am in the House of Commons, on the important night 
of Corn, having just introduced Morpeth as a new Member. It all 
makes me very nervous — I mean to speak to-night, and I must take 
care not to join in the bitterness of the Tories, and at the same 
time to avoid the praise of the Ministry, which I see is the fashion. 
... I am glad you all take such interest in the present struggle — 
it would be difficult not to do so. Our majority will, I hope, 
be eighty. As matters stand at present no one feels sure of the 
Lords. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, February 16, 1846 

The events of the last few days have been remarkable. There 
has been no move, no agitation in the counties ; but wherever a 
contest is announced the Protection party carry it hollow. , . . 
In London the Protectionists have created in a fortnight a very 
strong and compact party, from 220 to 240, in the Commons, 
and no one knows how many in the Lords — thus we are threatened 
with a revival of the real old Tory party. Of course they are very 
civil to us, and they all say that we ought to have settled this 
question and not Sir Robert. But how things may turn out no 
one can say. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, February 21, 1846 

I trust the feelings you have, and the enjoyment you seem to 
take in the flowers and buds of the garden, show that you have 
before you the opening Paradise of good health. 

Baby's letter is very merry indeed. I long to see his little face 
and curly locks again. 

I am going to have a meeting at twelve and of twelve on the 
affairs of Ireland. It is a thorny point, and vexes me more than 
the Corn Laws. Lord Bessborough and Lansdowne are too much 
jinclined to coercion, and I fear we shall not agree. But on the 
other hand, if we show ourselves for strong measures without 
lenitives, I fear we shall entirely lose the confidence of Ireland. 



82 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

February 22, 1846 

We are much occupied with the affairs of Ireland — I am 
engaged in persuading Lansdowne to speak out upon the affairs of 
that unhappy country, where a Bill called an Insurrection Act 
seems the ordinary medicine. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

MiNTO, February 23, 1846 

You were quite right to send the children out in spite of the 
remains of their coughs, but how hard it is for you to have all 
those domestic responsibilities added to your numerous public 
ones. It is more than your share, while I linger away my hours 
on the sofa, without so much as a dinner to order for anybody. 
Your Coercive measures for Ireland frighten me. I do not trust 
any Englishman on the subject except yourself, and you cannot 
keep to your own opinion in favour of leniency and act upon it. 
I often think how unfortunate it is that there should be that little 
channel of sea between England and Ireland. It prevents each 
country from considering itself a part of the other, and a bridge 
across it would make it much more difficult for Orange or Repeal 
bitterness to be kept up. I send you Lord William's ' letter. But 
first I must tell you that in a former letter from him he compared 
you to Antony throwing away the world for Cleopatra. ... I read 
one of Lord Campbell's Lives aloud yesterday evening — Sir 
Christopher Hatton — a short and entertaining one ; but from 
which it would appear that a man can make a respectable Lord 
Chancellor without having seriously studied anything except 
dancing. . . . 

Lord William Russell to Lady John Russell 

Genoa, February 12, 1846 

My dear Sister — I thank you much for your letter of the! 
4th from Minto, but regret to find my letters make you notj 
only angry, but very angry. If I was within reach I should! 
have my ears well cuffed, but at this distance I am bold. • • • 
You will not have to get into a towering passion in defending 
your husband from my accusation of loving you too muchj; 
and dashing the world aside and bid it pass, that he might |i 
enjoy a quiet life with his Fanny. I begin by obeying you and:; 
asking pardon and saying you did quite right not to think me! 
in earnest, and to " know that I often write what I do not mean,"! 
a fault unknown to myself, and one to be corrected, for it is a 
great fault, if not worse. The letter just received pleases me much, 

' Lord John Russell's brother. 



1846] LORD JOHN AND SACERDOTALISM 83 

for I find in it a high tone of moral rectitude, a noble feeling of 
devotion to your husband's calling, an unselfish determination to 
fulfil your destiny, an abnegation of domestic comfort, a latent 
feeling of ambition tempered with resignation, such as becomes a 
woman, that do you the highest honour. ... I think the crisis 
we are going through in England very alarming ... a frightful 
system of political immorality is stalking through the land — the 
Democracy is triumphant, the Aristocracy is making a noble and 
last effort to hold its own, unfortunately in so bad, so unjust, so 
selfish, so stupid a cause, that it must fall covered with shame. . . . 
The hero of the day, Cobden, is a great man in his way, the type 
of an honest manufacturer, but for the moment all-powerful. I am 
domiciled with your brother and sister,^ under the same roof, dine 
daily at their hospitable table, sit over the fire and cose and prose 
with them, sometimes alone with your sister, who thinks and talks 
very like you, that is, not only well but very well. 

I am very affectionately yours, 

W. R. 

PS. — You say it would be unworthy of John to pine for office. 
I think the difficulties of a Prime Minister so great and the toil so 
irksome that the country ought to be full of gratitude to any man 
that will undertake it. I am full of gratitude to Sir Robert Peel 
for having sacrificed his ease and enjoyment for the good of his 
country, and to enable us to sit in the shade under our own fig- 
trees. Glory and gratitude to Peel. 

Lord yohn to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, February 15, 1846 
I have been to St. Paul's to-day. Mr. Bennett enforced) still 
further obedience to the Church, and what was strange, he^ said 
Papists and Dissenters were prevented by the prejudices of 
education from seeing the truth — as if the same thing were not 
just as true of his own Church. I do not see how it is possible 
to be out of the Roman Catholic pale and not use one's own 
faculties on the interpretation of the Bible. That tells us that our 
Saviour said, he who knew that to love God with all our soul and 
to love our neighbour as ourself were the two great commandments, 
was not far from the kingdom of God. This surely can be known 
and even followed without a priest at all. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

MiNTO, February 27, 1846 
You seem to have had a very pleasant dinner at the Berrys, 
and I wish I had been at it. I wonder sometimes whether the 

' Lady Mary Abercromby. 



84 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

social enjoyments of life are for ever at an end for me : and in my 
hopeful moods I plan all sorts of pleasant little teas at Chesham 
Place — at home from nine to eleven on certain days, in an easy 
way, without smart dressing and preparation of any sort beyond 
a few candles and plenty of tea. I feel and always have felt 
ambitious to establish some more popular and rational kind of 
society than is usual in London. But the difficulty in our position 
would be to limit the numbers : however, limiting the hours would 
help to do this ; and I do not think one need be very brilliant or 
agreeable oneself to make such a thing succeed well. But what a 
foolish presumptuous being I am, lying here on my sofa, not even 
able to share in the quiet amusements of Minto, making schemes 
for the entertainment of all the London world ! However, these 
dreams and others of a more serious nature as to my future life, if 
God should restore me to health, help to while away my hours of 
separation from you, and make me forget for awhile how long I 
have been debarred from fulfilling my natural duties, either to you, 
the children, or the world. This, beheve me, is the hardest of 
the many hard trials that belong to illness, or at least, such an 
illness as mine, in which I have mercifully but little physical 
suffering. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Minto, March i, 1846 

What pleasant times we live in, when the triumph of right 
principles brings about one great and peaceful change after 
another in our country ; each one (this from Free Trade in a 
great degree) promising an increase of happiness and diminution 
of war and bloodshed to the whole world. No doubt, however, 
its good effects will be but slowly perceived, and I fear there is 
much disappointment in store for the millions of poor labourers, 
who expect to have abundance of food and clothing the moment 
the Bill becomes a law. Poor creatures, their state is most 
deplorable and haunts me day and night. The very best of Poor 
Laws must be quite insufficient. Indeed, wherever there is a 
necessity for a Poor Law at all there must be something wrong, 
I think ; for if each proprietor, farmer and clergyman did his 
duty there would be no misery, and if they do not, no Poor Law 
can prevent it. You cannot think how I long for a few acres of 
our own, in order to know and do what little I could for the poor 
round us. It would not lessen one's deep pity for the many in all 
other parts of the country, but one's own conscience would be 
relieved from what, rightly or wrongly, I now feel as a weight 
upon it ; and without a permanent residence one does not become 
really acquainted with poor people in their prosperity as well as 
adversity ; one only does a desultory unsatisfactory sort of good. 



1846] PEEL'S IRISH MEASURES 85 

I have not seen Dickens's letter about the ragged schools of which 
you speak. What you say of the devotion of the Roman Catholic 
priests to the charities of religion reflects shame on ours of a 
purer faith, but is what I have always supposed. The Puseyites 
are most like them in that as well as in their mischievous 
doctrines ; but then a new sect is always zealous for good as 
well as for evil. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Chesham Place, March 3, 1846 

I am so happy to find you have had a good night and are 
stronger in feeling. If you had not told me how weak and ill 
you have been I should have been beyond measure anxious ; but, 
as it is, and with your letters, I have been very unhappy and 
exceedingly disappointed. For my hopes are often extravagant, 
and I love to look forward to days of health and happiness and 
gratitude to God for His blessings. . . . Need I say after all I 
have suffered on your account that while I am conducting my 
campaign in Italy ^ my thoughts are always with you ? . . . I 
cannot bear your absence. The interest of a great crisis, and the 
best company of London cannot make me tolerably patient under 
the misfortune of your being away ; and it is you, and you alone 
who could inspire me with such deep love. 

Peel had taken the first step towards feeding the poor at 
home. He had also done his best to relieve the immediate 
distress of Ireland. Shiploads of Indian corn had been 
landed, and public works for the help of the destitute estab- 
lished up and down the country. But the chief grievance of 
the Irish, which was at the bottom of half the agrarian crime, 
had not been remedied. The House of Lords, by having 
thrown out Peel's Bill for compensating outgoing tenants 
for improvements their own money or exertions had created, 
was largely responsible for the violence and sedition now 
threatening life and property throughout Ireland. The true 
remedy having been rejected by the Lords, the Government 
had to meet violence by violence. No sooner had the Corn 
Bill been passed in the House of Commons than Peel brought 
in a stringent Sedition Bill for Ireland. Lord John and the 
Whigs disliked the Bill because it was extremely harsh. 

' An allusion to Napoleon's letters to Josephine from Italy, which she 
had been reading. 



86 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, March 12, 1846 
Nothing that I read in the speeches in favour of the Coercion 
Bill convinced me that it would do the slightest good. ... It 
must embitter the Irish against England, for which there is 
no need. Nothing can be more shocking than the continual 
outrages and murders in Ireland ; but it is the penalty we 
pay for a long course of misgovernment, and from which 
nothing but a long course of mild and good government can 
set us free ; certainly not severe indiscriminate measures which 
mark out Ireland still more as an unhappy conquered province, 
instead of a part of the nation. Such are my sentiments, dearest, 
on this subject, which always makes my blood boil. ... I read the 
" Giaour " two nights ago to Addy — it has as great and as numerous 
beauties as any poem Byron ever wrote — but I find I am not old 
enough, or wise enough, or good enough to hear Byron, and left 
off feeling miserable, as he always contrives to make one ; despair 
is what he excels in, and he makes it such beautiful despair that 
all sense of right or wrong is overwhelmed by it. I said to Addy 
that one always requires an antidote after reading Byron, and that 
she and I ought instantly to go and hem pocket-handkerchiefs, or 
make a pudding — and that is what she has illustrated in the 
newspaper I send. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

House of Commons, March^ 1846 
Your views about the Irish Coercion Bill are very natural ; but 
Bessborough, who is the best authority we have about Irish 
matters, thinks it will tend to stop crime — and especially the 
crime of murder. I should be loath to throw out a Bill which 
may have this good effect ; but I shall move a resolution which 
will pledge the House to measures of remedy and conciliation. 
This may lead to a great debate. . , . The little girls look very 
nice, but Toza ^ is, if possible, thinner than ever. However, she 
laughs and dances like a little fairy. I dined with Mrs. 
Drummond yesterday. Macaulay* was there — entertaining, and 
not too much of a monopolist — I mean of talk — which, like other 
monopolies, is very disagreeable. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, March 19, 1846 
After dinner we drove to Portobello sands and there got out 

' Victoria. 

' Lord John had written to his wife in April, 1845 : " Macaulay made 
one of his splendid speeches again last night. ... He is a wonderfurman, 
and must with the years before him be a great leader." 



1846] LETTERS FROM EDINBURGH 87 

and walked for an hour ; the sea was of the brightest blue, covered 
with sails ; Inchkeith and the opposite coast so clear that every 
inequality of hill or rock was seen ; Arthur's Seat, grand and 
snowy, was behind us, and the glittering sands under our feet — 
the whole beautiful far beyond description and beyond what I 
have yet seen it in any weather ; for the east wind and bright 
sun are what it requires. How I did wish for you ! I need not 
say that I only half enjoyed it, as I only half enjoy anything 
without you. My comfort in your absence is to think that you are 
not taken from me for nothing, but for your country's service ; and 
that even if we could have foreseen four years ago all the various 
anxieties and trials that awaited us, we should have married all 
the same. As it was, we knew that ours could not be a life of 
quiet ease ; and it was for me to decide whether I was able to face 
the reverse — and I did decide, and I am able — 

" lo lo cercai, fui preso 
Dall' alta indole sua, dal suo gran nome ; 
Pensai dapprima, oh pensai che incarco 
E r amor d'un uomo che a gli' altri e sopra ! 
Perche allor correr, solo io nol lasciai 
La sua splendida via, s' io non potea 
Seguire i passi suoi ? " 

Now I am sure you do not know where those lines are from. 
They are a wee bit altered from Manzoni's " Carmagnola " ; and 
they struck me so much, when I read them to-day, as applicable 
to you and me, and made me think of your " splendida via " and 
all its results. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, March 23, 1846 

Thanks for your precious letter of Saturday. You need not 
grieve at having brought cares and anxieties . . . upon me. You 
have given me a love that repays them all ; and such words as you 
write in that letter strengthen me for all that our *' splendida 
via " may entail upon us, however contrary to my natural tastes 
or trying to my natural feelings. What a delightful hope you 
give of your getting away on the 2nd — but I am too wise to 
build upon it. 

Lady John io Lord John Russell 

Edinburgh, March 25, 1846 

.... There is a calmness and fairness and depth in conversa- 
tion here which one seldom meets with in London, where people 
are too much taken up by the present to dwell upon the past, or 



88 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

look forward to the future — and where consequently passion and 
prejudice are mixed up with most that one hears. Dante, and 
Milton, and Shakespeare, etc., have little chance amid the hubbub of 
the great city — but with all its faults, the great city is the place in 
the world I most wish to see again. ... At poor Lady Holland's 
one did hear the sort of conversation I find here, and surely you 
must miss not only her but her house very much. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

April 3, 1846 

At all events pray do not distress yourself with the reflexion 
that you will not be a companion to me during my political trials. 
You have been feeling strong, . . . that strength will, I trust, 
return. I see no reason why it should not — and there is no one 
in existence who can think so well with my thoughts and feel so 
truly with my feelings as yourself. So in sickness and in sorrow, 
so in joy and prosperity, we must rely on each other and let 
no discouraging apprehensions shake our courage. 

Meanwhile in Parliament the Irish Coercion Bill was 
dragging on. Lord Bessborough and other Whig peers had 
changed their mind about its value, and Lord John, instead of 
proposing an amendment, definitely opposed it. The Pro- 
tectionists, eager to revenge themselves upon Peel, who, they 
felt, had betrayed them, caught at the opportunity and voted 
with the Whigs. The Government was defeated by a large 
majority on the very day the Repeal of the Corn Laws passed 
the House of Lords, and the Queen sent for Lord John, who 
became Prime Minister in July, 1846. 

This time, beyond the usual troubles in the distribution of 
offices, he had no difficulty in forming a Ministry ; but when 
formed it was in an unusually difficult position. They were in 
power only because the Protectionists had chosen to send 
Peel about his business, and the Irish problem was growing 
more and more acute. The potato crop of 1846 was even 
worse than that of 1845, and Peel's system of public works 
had proved an expensive failure, more pauperising than 
almsgiving. The Irish population fell from eight millions to 
five, and those who survived handed down an intensified 
hatred of England, which lives in some of their descendants 
to this day. 



1846] LORD JOHN, PRIME MINISTER 89 

In the autumn of 1846 Lord John, Httle thinking that 
a home would soon be offered to him by the Queen, bought a 
country place, Chorley Wood, near Rickmansworth. 



Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Chorley Wood, Rickmansworth, December 12, 1846 

About the loth January we all go back to town for good, 
as John must be there some time before the meeting of Par- 
liament. Oh that meeting of Parliament ! It is so different 
from any I have ever looked forward to ; and though it has 
always been awful, this is so much more so. I shall then 
first really feel that John is Minister, and find out the pains of 
the position, having as yet little experience of anything but 
the pleasures of it. Then will come the daily toil beyond his 
strength, the daily abuse to reward him, and the daily trial to 
us both of hardly meeting for a quarter of an hour between break- 
fast and bedtime. In short, I had better not begin to enumerate 
the evils that await us, as they are innumerable. However, 
I feel very courageous and that they will appear trifles if he 
succeeds j and if he is turned out before the end of the session, I 
shall never regret that he has made the attempt. It is a fearful 
time to have the government in his hands ; but for that very 
reason I am glad that he and no other has it. The accounts from 
Ireland are worse and worse, and what with the extreme misery of 
the unfortunate poor and the misbehaviour of the gentry, he 
: made very miserable. As he said this morning, at times they 
almost drive him mad. 

During Lady John's long illness in Edinburgh, Francis 
Lord Jeffrey had been one of her kindest friends, and had 
helped to brighten many a weary hour by his visits and 
conversation. 

Lord Jeffrey to Lady John Russell 

Edinburgh, December 21, 1846 

It is very good in you to remember my sunset visits to you in 
the hotel. I never pass by its windows in these winter twilights 
without thinking of you, and of the lessons of cheerful magnanimity 
(as well as other things) I used to learn by the side of your couch. 
The Murrays and Rutherfords are particularly well ; the latter will 
soon be up among you, and at his post for the opening of a cam- 
paign of no common interest and anxiety. For my part, I am 



90 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1846 

terribly frightened — for the first time, I beheve I may say, in my 
life. Lord John, I believe, does not know what fear is ! sans peur 
as sans reproche. But it would be a comfort to know that even he 
thinks we can get out of the mess in Ireland without some dreadful 
calamity. And how ugly, in fact, do things look all round the 
world ! 

One of the first acts of Lord John's Government was to 
vote ;^io,ooo,ooo for the relief of Ireland. In July, 1847, 
Parliament was dissolved. When it met again Lord John 
was reluctantly compelled to ask for its votes in support of 
an Irish Bill resembling the one on which the Liberals had 
defeated Peel the year before. 

A bare enumeration of the difficulties which beset the new 
Prime Minister brings home a sense of his unenviable position. 
Ireland was on the verge of starvation and revolt ; everywhere 
in Europe the rebellions which culminated in 1848 were 
beginning to stir, seeming then more formidable than they 
really were in their immediate consequences ; in England the 
Chartist movement was thought to threaten Crown and Con- 
stitution ; and, in addition, the country had taken alarm at the 
weakness of its military defences. Lastly, for power to meet all 
these emergencies Lord John was dependent, at every juncture, 
upon the animosity between the Protectionists and Peelites 
proving stronger than the dislike which either party felt for 
the Government. There were 325 Liberals in the House ; the 
Protectionists numbered 226 ; the Conservative Free Traders 
105 ; so the day Protectionists and Peelites came to terms 
would be fatal to the Government. Such were the troubles of 
the Prime Minister, who was a man to take them hard. As 
for his wife, her diaries and letters show that, however high 
her spirit and firm her principles, her nature was an intensely 
anxious one. 

In December, 1846, they both went down for a short holiday 
to Chorley Wood, where, on the last night of the year, they 
held a " grand ball for children and servants. All very merry. 
John danced a great deal, and I not a little. Darling Johnny 
danced the first country dance, holding his Papa's hand and 
mine." 



CHAPTER VI 

1847-52 

ON January i, 1847, Lady John wrote in her diary that 
the year was beginning most prosperously for her and 
those dearest to her. " Within my own home all is peace 
and happiness." About a month later she became dangerously 
ill in London. 

London, February 21, 1847 

I have been very ill since I last wrote. ... I felt that life was 
still dear to me for the sake of those I love and of those who depend 
on me. ... I saw the look of agony of my dearest husband ; I 
thought of my heart's treasure — my darling boy ; I thought of my 
other beloved children ; I thought of those still earlier loved — my 
dear, dear Papa and Mama, brothers and sisters. But I was calm 
and ready to go, if such should be God's will. . . . Dr. Rigby has 
been not only the most skilful doctor, but the kindest friend. 

In the spring of this year, 1847, the Queen offered Pem- 
broke Lodge to the Prime Minister. He accepted with 
thankfulness, and throughout life both he and Lady John 
felt deep gratitude to the Queen for their beautiful home. 

Pembroke Lodge is a long, low, irregular white house on 
the edge of the high ground which forms the western limit of 
Richmond Park. Added to and altered many times, it has no 
unity of plan, but it has kept a character of its own, an air of 
cheerful seclusion and homely eighteenth-century dignity. On 
the eastern side it is screened from the road by shrubs and 
trees ; on the other side, standing as it does upon the top of 
the steep, wooded ridge above the Thames Valley, its windows 
overlook a thousand fields, through which the placid river 
winds, now flowing between flat open banks, now past groups 
of trees, or by gardens where here and there the corner of an 

91 



92 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

old brick house shows among cedars. The grounds are long 
rather than wide, and comprise the slope towards the valley 
and the stretch along the summit of the ridge, where beech, 
oak, and chestnut shade with their green and solemn presences 
a garden of shorn turf and border flowers. Walking beneath 
them, you see between their stems part of some slow-sailing 
cloud or glimpses of the distant plain ; as you descend, the 
gardens, village, and river near below. There is a peculiar 
charm in these steep woods, where the tops of some trees are 
level with the eye, while the branches of others are overhead. 
As the paths go down the slope they lose their garden-like trim- 
ness among bracken and brambles. An oak fence separates 
the grounds of Pembroke Lodge from the surrounding park. 

It was indeed a perfect home for a statesman. When 
wearied or troubled with political cares and anxieties, the 
fresh breezes, the natural beauties, and the peace of Pembroke 
Lodge often helped to bring calm and repose to his mind. 
What better prospect can his windows command than the 
valley of the Thames from Richmond Hill, the view Argyll 
showed Jeanie Deans, which drew from her the admission " it 
was braw rich feeding for the cows," though she herself would 
as soon have been looking at " the craigs of Arthur's Seat and 
the sea coming ayont them, as at a' that muckle trees." 
Certainly no home was ever more appreciated and loved than 
Pembroke Lodge, both by Lord and Lady John Russell and 
their children. Long afterwards Lady John wrote : 

In March, 1847, the Queen offered him Pembroke Lodge for 
life, a deed for which we have been yearly and daily more 
grateful. He and I were convinced that it added years to his 
life, and the happiness it has given us all cannot be measured. 
I think it was a year or two before the Queen offered us 
Pembroke Lodge that we came down for a few days for a 
change of air for some of the children to the Star and Garter. 
John and I, in one of our strolls in the park, sat under a 
big oak-tree while the children played round us. We were 
at that time often in perplexity about a country home for the 
summer and autumn, to which we could send them before we 
ourselves could leave London. . . . From our bench under the oak 
we looked into the grounds of Pembroke Lodge, and we said to 
one another that would be the place for us. When it became ours 



1847-52] PEMBROKE LODGE 93 

indeed we often thought of this, and the oak has ever since been 
called the '' Wishing Tree." ' . . . From the time that Pembroke 
Lodge became ours we used only to keep the children in town 
from the meeting of Parliament till Easter, and settle the younger 
ones at Pembroke Lodge, and we ourselves slept there Wednes- 
days, Saturdays, and Sundays with as much regularity as other 
engagements allowed. This obliged us to give up most dinner 
engagements in London, and we regretted the consequent loss of 
society. At the same time he always felt the need of those evenings 
and mornings of rest and change and country air (besides those 
welcome and blessed Sundays) after Parliamentary and official toil, 
rather than of heated and crowded rooms and late hours ; and he 
had the happy power of throwing off public cares and giving his 
whole heart to the enjoyment of his strolls in the garden, walks 
and rides in the park, and the little interests of the children.^ 

The short Whitsuntide holiday was spent in settling in at 
Pembroke Lodge. 

Lady ^ohn Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Pembroke Lodge, October 29, 1847 

. . . You would not wonder so much at his [Lord John's] 
silence lately, if you knew, what nobody but English Ministers' 
wives can know or conceive, how incessantly either his mind or 
body or both have been at work on financial affairs. 

He has gone to town every morning early, Sunday included ; 
worked hard the whole day in Downing Street, writing long letters 
and seeing one man and one deputation after another, on these 
most difficult and most harassing subjects — only returning here 
for tea, and with no time for any other correspondence but that 
between tea and bed, when a little rest and amusement is almost 
necessary for him — then waking in the night to think of bullion 
and Exchequer Bills till time to get up. Now this great anxiety 
is partly over ; for when once he has taken a resolution, after all 
the reflection and consideration he can give to a subject, he feels 
that he has done his best, and awaits its success or failure with 
comparative ease of mind. 

The difficulties of this Ministry have been briefly stated at 
the close of the last chapter ; working with a precarious 
majority, they had to cope with starvation and revolt in Ireland, 
Chartism in England, and disturbances abroad. 

' When Pembroke Lodge was offered to them they remembered — with 
surprise and deUght at its fulfilment — the wish of that day, known to 
themselves alone. * Appendix at end of chapter. 



94 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

In December, 1847, they passed their Irish Coercion 
Bill.i The passing of this Bill was one of the few occasions 
on which Lady John could not convince herself that her 
husband's policy was the wisest one. 

Subsequently, during the enforcement of the Act, the 
bitterness of the attacks upon her husband, who, she knew, 
wished Ireland well, and the sight of his anxiety, made her 
for a time less sympathetic with the Irish ; but she did not, 
and could not, approve of the Government's action at the 
time. Among Irishmen, a Government which had first 
opposed a Tory Coercion Bill, and when in power proposed 
one themselves, might well excite indignation. Ireland was 
already in a state so miserable that the horrors of a civil 
war with a bare chance of better things beyond must have 
seemed well worth risking to her people, now the party 
which had hitherto befriended them had adopted the policy 
of their oppressors. 

On February 26, 1848, the news that Louis Philippe had 
been deposed reached the House of Commons. "This is 
what would have happened here," said Sir Robert Peel, "if 
these gentlemen [pointing to the Protectionists] had had their 
way." The astonishment was great, and the fear increased 
that the Chartist movement and Irish troubles would lead to 
revolution at home. 

The immediate cause of the revolution in France had been 
Louis Philippe's opposition to electoral reform ; only one 
Frenchman in about a hundred and fifty possessed a vote 
under his reign. " Royalty having been packed off in 
a hackney coach," the mildest of Parisian mobs contented 
itself with smashing the King's bust, breaking furniture, 
and firing at the clock of the Tuileries that it might 
register permanently upon its face the propitious moment 
of his departure. He had mbarked the next day for 

' " The state of Ireland was chaotic, and Lord Clarendon (Lord 
Lieutenant) was demanding a stringent measure of coercion. He did 
not get it. . . . The two Bills [Sir Robert Peel's in 1846 and the Bill of 
1847] were so entirely different that to call them by a common name, 
though perhaps inevitable, is also inevitably misleading" (" Histor)' of 
Modern England," Herbert Paul, vol. i, chap. iv. See also Walpole's 
" Life of Lord John Russell," vol. i, chap, xvii.) 



1847-52] REVOLUTION IN FRANCE 95 

England, shaven and in green spectacles, and landed upon 
our shores under the modest pseudonym of " William Smith." 
England did not welcome him. His Spanish marriage 
intrigues had naturally not made him a favourite, and his 
enemy, Palmerston, was at the Foreign Office. Two days 
afterwards Louis Napoleon Bonaparte left England to pay his 
respects to the Provisional Government. " I hasten," he 
wrote in memorable words, " I hasten from exile to place 
myself under the flag of the Republic just proclaimed. With- 
out other ambition than that of being useful to my country, I 
announce my arrival to the members of the Provisional 
Government, and assure them of my devotion to the cause 
which they represent." He was, however, courteously re- 
quested to withdraw from France, since the law banishing the 
Napoleon family had not yet been repealed, a circumstance 
which enabled him to return to England in time to enrol 
himself in the cause of law and order as a special constable 
at the Chartist meeting. 

London, February 26, 1848 

We and everybody much taken up with the startling and in 
some respects terrible events in France. The regency of the 
Duchess of Orleans rejected by the Chambers, or rather by the 
Cote Gauche, and a republic proclaimed. Sad loss of life in Paris 
— the King and Queen fled to Eu — Guizot, it is said, to Brussels. 
We dined at the Palace, and found the Queen and Prince, the 
Duchess of Kent, Duke and Duchess of Saxe Coburg, thinking of 
course of little else — and almost equally of course, full of nothing 
but indignation against the French nation and Guizot, nothing but 
pity for the King and Queen and royal family, and nothing but 
fears for the rest of Europe from the infection of such an example. 
I sat next the Duke of Coburg, who more particularly took this 
class view with very little reasoning and a great deal of declama- 
tion. Said he should not care if Guizot lost his head, and much 
in the same spirit. The Queen spoke with much good sense and 
good feeling, if not with perfect impartiality. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

London, March 3, 1848 

How anxious you must be as to the effect which the extra- 
ordinary events in France will have upon Italy. They have been 
so rapid and unexpected that all power of reasoning upon them 



96 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

has been lost in wonder. Some pity must inevitably be felt for 
any man ** fallen from his high estate " ; but if, as I trust, the 
report of Louis Philippe's safety and arrival in England is true, 
his share of it will be as small as ever fell to the lot of a King in 
misfortune ; for the opinion that he has deserved it is general. It 
is seldom that history gives so distinct a lesson of retribution. 
You know what London is in a ferment of exciting events, and can 
therefore pretty well imagine the constant succession of reports, 
true and false, from hour to hour, the unceasing cries of the 
newsmen with 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th editions of all the news- 
papers, the running about of friends to one another's houses, the 
continual crossing of notes in the streets, each asking the same 
questions, the hopes and fears and the conjectures one hears and 
utters during the course of the day, and the state of blank, weary 
stupidity to which one is reduced by the end of it. What / mind 
most in it all is the immense additional anxiety and responsibility 
it brings upon my poor husband, who feels it even more than he 
would have done any other year from being still, I grieve to say, 
less strong and well owing to his influenza still hanging about him. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, March 29, 1848 

John returned to dinner, but some hours later than I expected 
him, which in times like these, when each hour may bring an 
account of a new revolution somewhere, or worst of all, of a 
rebellion in Ireland, is a trial to a Minister's wife. However, the 
reason was simply that Prince Albert had detained him talking. 
... Of course we talked a great deal with our visitors of France, 
Italy, Germany, and Ireland ; but happily, engrossing as these 
topics are, the bright sun and blue sky and shining river and 
opening leaves and birds and squirrels would have their share of 
attention, and give some rest to our minds. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Pembroke Lodge, March 31, 1848 

The preparations for rebellion in Ireland are most alarming, 
and John's usually calm and hopeful spirit more nearly fails him on 
that subject than any other. The speeches and writings of the 
Young Ireland leaders are so extravagantly seditious, and so grossly 
false as to the behaviour of England generally, and the present 
Ministry in particular to Ireland, that I cannot but hope they may 
defeat their own objects. . . . Poor people, the more deeply one 
feels for the starving and destitute millions among them and 
admires their patience and resignation, and the more bitterly one 



1847-52J CHARTIST MEETING 97 

resents the misgovernment under which the whole nation suffered 
for hundreds of years, the fruits of which we are now reaping, the 
less one can excuse those reckless ones who are now misleading 
them, who must and do know that the present Ministers have not 
looked on with indifference and let famine and fever rage at will ; 
that the subject of Ireland is not one to which the Houses of 
Parliament never give a day's or an hour's thought, but that on the 
contrary, her interests and happiness are daily and nightly the 
object of more intense anxiety and earnest endeavours on the part 
of her rulers than any portion of the Empire. We have had a 
week of such real spring with all its enjoyments, and to-day is so 
much finer and milder than ever, that the notion of streets and 
smoke and noise is odious. However, we have enough to go for, 
private and public. May God prosper the good cause of peace 
and freedom all over Europe. 

The European revolutionary movement of 1848 did not 
prove serious in England. What actually took place was a 
mild mass meeting on Kennington Common, well kept within 
the bounds of decorum by an army of citizen police. In 
Ireland, a rough-and-tumble fight between Smith O'Brien's 
followers and the police was all that came of the dreaded 
rebellion. But before these events took place the future 
looked ominous, especially to those responsible for what 
might happen. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromby 

April 8, 1848 
John had a late night in the House, and made two speeches 
on the unpleasant subjects of the Chartist meeting next Monday 
and Sir George Grey's " Security of the Crown " Bill ; both of 
which ought to do good, from their mild and whiggish tone, in 
spite of the sadly zm-whiggish nature of the topics ; the very last 
to which one would wish a Whig Government to have to turn its 
attention. All minds are full of next Monday, and at this moment 
we have not a manservant in the house, as they are summoned to 
a meeting to learn their duties as special constables for that day. 
I find it difficult to be in the least frightened, and I trust I am 
right. The only thing I dread is being long without knowing what 
John is about, and as he would be equally unwilling to know 
nothing about me, in case of any march upon this house or any 
other disagreeable demonstration against the Prime Minister, we 
have arranged that I am to go to Downing Street with him in the 
morning and remain all day there, as that is the place he will 

H 



98 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

most easily come to from the House of Commons. My spirits 
have been much lowered about the whole thing this morning, as 
Mr. Trevelyan has been here and persuaded ! ohn that it would be 
madness for me either to remain in this house or go to Downing 
Street, both of which would be marks in case of a fight. 

Mr. Trevelyan is very seriously alarmed, and talks of the effect 
the sound of the cannon might have upon me, and has persuaded 
Lady Mary Wood to go to his house on Clapham Common. I 
do not yet know what the other Ministers' wives are going to do, 
but I do know that I think Milton quite right in saying : 

" The wife, where danger or dishonour lurks, 
Safest and seemliest by her husband bides." 

However, I must do as I am bid, or at least I must do what 
makes him easiest. 

London, April 9, 1848 

Hardly knew how much I had been thinking of to-morrow 
till I had to read aloud the prayers for Queen, country, and 
Parliament. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromby 

Downing Street, Monday, 3 o'clock 

Well, here we are after all. Lady Grey, Lady Mary Wood, and 
I, with much easier minds than we have had for many days. 

Everything has ended quietly ; the meeting has dispersed at 
the persuasion of its leaders, who took fright. Fergus O'Connor 
especially has shown himself the most abject blusterer, and came 
pale and haggard and almost crying to speak to Sir George Grey — 
and told him how anxious he was that all should come to a 
peaceable end. 

It seems too good to be true, after the various alarmingreports 
and conjectures. Of course there will still be some anxiety until 
the night is well over, and till we see whether the Chartist spirit 
rises again after this failure. To begin at the beginning, I ought 
to tell you that hearing a great clattering at six this morning I got 
up, and looked out, and saw immense numbers of Lancers ride 
from the West into Belgrave Square, which they left to go to 
their destination somewhere about Portland Place, after performing 
many pretty manoeuvres which I did not understand. Many foot 
soldiers passed by. I admired the sight, but silently prayed that 
their services might not be required. We packed the brougham 
full of mattresses and blankets, as it seemed likely that we should 
have to sleep here. Now we have little doubt of getting home. 



1847-52] LETTER FROM THE QUEEN 99 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromhy 

London, April 12, 1848 

Yesterday was chiefly spent in receiving visits and congratu- 
lations without end, and very welcome they were. John and I 
had also a good long walk to freshen him up for a hard day in 
the House of Commons. . . . 

April 13, 1848 

Again many notes and visits of congratulation and mutual 
rejoicing yesterday. God grant that this triumph of the good 
cause may have some effect on unhappy, misguided Ireland ; there 
is the weight that almost crushes John, who opens Lord Clarendon's 
daily letters with an uneasiness not to be told. 

Queen Victoria to Lord yohn Russell 

Osborne, April 14, 1848 

The Queen has received Lord John Russell's letter of yester- 
day evening. She approves that a form of prayer for the present 
time of tumult and trouble be ordered. She concludes it is for 
peace and quiet generally, which indeed we may well pray for. A 
thanksgiving for the failure of any attempts like the proposed one 
last Monday, the Queen would not have thought judicious, as 
being painful and unlike thanksgiving for preservation from 
foreign war. 

Our accounts from Germany yesterday, from different quarters, 
were very distressing and alarming. So much fear of a total sub- 
version of all existing things. But we must not lose courage 
or hope. 

In the midst of these troubles and forebodings, on the day 
that the Queen wrote the above letter to Lord John, their 
second son, George William Gilbert, was born. 

Lady John was touched by the following letter from 
Dr. James Simpson (the eminent physician, later Sir James 
Simpson), under whose medical care she had been in Edin- 
burgh some years before. 

[Edinburgh,] March, 1848 

I heard from two or three different sources that your Lady- 
ship was to be blessed by an addition to your family. . . . 

I once made a pledge, that I would gladly leave all to watch 
and guard over your safety if you desired me. I have not for- 
gotten the pledge, and am ready to redeem it — but not for fee or 



loo LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

recompense, only for the love and pleasure of being near you at a 
time I could possibly show my gratitude by watching over your 
valued health and life. . . . With almost all my medical brethren 
here I use chloroform in all cases. None of us, I believe, could 
now feel justified in not relieving pain, when God has bestowed 
upon us the means of relieving it. 

May 16, 1848 

With a thankful heart I begin my diary again. Another 
child has been added to our blessings — another dear little boy. 
John was with me. Oh ! his happiness when all was safely over. 
This child has done much already to restore his health and 
strength. Summer weather and the success of all his political 
measui^es for the last anxious months have also done much. 

But the Irish troubles were by no means over ; on July 21st 
Lord John introduced a Bill for the suspension of the Habeas 
Corpus Act in Ireland. His case rested on Lord Clarendon's 
evidence that a rebellion was on the point of breaking out, 
and circumstances seem to have justified this precautionary 
measure. The Bill was passed without opposition and with 
the support of all the prominent men in Parliament. 

J^uly 21, 1848 

Irish news much the same. A Cabinet at which it was deter- 
mined to propose suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act. John 
accordingly gave notice of it in the House. I had hoped that a 
Whig Ministry would never be driven to such measures. I had 
hoped that Ireland would remember my husband's rule for ever 
with gratitude. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

London, July 28, 1848 

I have another letter to thank you for. You really must not 
describe the beauties of that place to me any more. It must so 
perfectly satisfy the longing for what, after some years of such a 
life as ours, seems the height of happiness — repose. I struggle 
hard against this longing, but I doubt whether I should do so 
successfully without that blessed Pembroke Lodge, from which I 
always return newly armed for the turmoil. After all, I am much 
more afraid of my husband being overpowered by this longing 
than myself. He can so much seldomer indulge in it. He is so 
much older, and it is so much more difficult for him to portion out 



1847-52] RUMOURS OF REBELLION loi 

his employments with any regularity, which is his best preservative 
against fuss. Yesterday was a most trying day for him, and the 
more so as he had looked forward to it as one of rest and enjoy- 
ment. It was Baby's christening-day, and we meant to remain at 
Pembroke Lodge after the ceremony to luncheon ; but just as we 
were going to church came a letter from Sir George Grey with 
news of the whole South of Ireland being in rebellion, with 
horrible additions of bloodshed, defection of the troops, etc. As 
it has, thank God, turned out to be a hoax, a most wicked hoax, 
of some stockjobbing or traitorous wretch at Liverpool, I shall 
not waste your time and sympathies by telling you of the anxious 
hours we spent till seven in the evening, when the truth was 
made out. 

And now let us trust that real rebellion may not be in store. 
It is dreadful to think of bloodshed, of loss of life, of the desola- 
tion of one's country and of the many, many imaginable and 
unimaginable miseries of civil war ; but one thing I feel would be 
more dreadful still, weak and womanly as I may be in so feeling — 
to see one's husband unable to prevent the miseries, perhaps 
accusing himself of them, and sinking, as I know mine would, by 
degrees under his efforts and his regrets. Let us trust and pray, 
then, that we are not doomed to see the reality of so gloomy a 
picture. It is always difficult to me to look forward to great 
political failures and national misfortunes, perhaps because I have 
never known any ; but the alarm of yesterday has made them 
seem more possible. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromby 

London, August 3, 1848 

... I do not care for my country or my husband's success a bit 
more than is good for me, and I often wonder at and almost 
blame myself for not being more disturbed about them. 

I know that he does his best, and that is all I care very deeply 
or very permanently about ; though there may now and then be a 
more than commonly anxious day. If I thought him stupid, or 
mean, or ignorant, or thoughtless, or indifferent in his trade, I 
should not be satisfied with his doing his best even ; but as I 
luckily think him the contrary of all these things, I am both 
satisfied and calm, and his own calm mind helps me to be so. 
Sometimes I think I care much more about politics at a distance 
than when I am mixed up in them. The fact is that I care very 
much for the questions themselves, but grow wearied to death of 
all the details and personalities belonging to them, and con- 
sequently of the conversation of lady politicians, made up as it is 
of these details and personalities. And the more interested I am 
in the thing itself, the more angry I am with the nonsense they 



I02 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

talk about it, and had rather Hsten to the most humdrum domestic 
twaddle. Mind, I mean the regular hardened lady politicians 
who talk of nothing else, of whom I could name several, but 
will not. 

Pembroke Lodge, November 24, 1848 

We have just had a visit from Louis Philippe. He spoke 
much of France — said that his wishes were with Louis Bonaparte 
rather than with Cavaignac for the presidency. 

John expressed some fear of war if Louis Bonaparte should be 
elected ; the King said he need have none, that France had 
neither means nor inclination for war. His account of the dis- 
missal of Guizot's Ministry was that he said to Guizot " What's to 
be done ? " — that Guizot gave him three answers : " Je ne peux pas 
donner la Reforme. Je ne peux pas laisser dissoudre la garde 
nationale. Je ne peux pas laisser tirer les troupes sur la garde 
nationale." Upon this he had said to Guizot that he must change 
his Ministry : *' Cela Fa peut-etre un peu blesse — ma foi, je n'en 
sais rien. II a dit que non, que j'etais le maitre." 

When he heard that the National Guard said, if the troops fired 
on the mob, they would fire on the troops, he knew that " la chose 
etait finie," and when he went out himself among the National 
Guard, to see what the effect of his presence would be, La 
Moriciere called out to him, ** Sire, si vous allez parmi ces gens-la 
je ne reponds pas de votre vie. lis vont tirer sur vous." He 
answered whatever might come of it he would " parler a ces 
braves gens " ; but they surrounded him, grinning and calling out 
" La Reforme, nous voulons la Reforme," pointing their bayonets 
at him and even over his horse's neck. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromby 

WoBURN Abbey, December 10, 1848 

The great question of the French Presidency is decided, 
whether for good or for evil to other countries none can foresee, 
but certainly to the disgrace of their own. For here is a man, 
known only by a foolish attempt to disturb France, to whom no 
party gives credit for either great or good qualities, raised to the 
highest dignity in the new Republic, one of the advantages of 
which was to be that men should rise by their own merits alone. 
The common language of Frenchmen, or at least of French Royalists 
on the subject, is that they consider his election as a step to the 
restoration of Monarchy — but it is a shabby way of making the 
step, or it may prove a false one. You know we have had Louis 
Philippe and his family as near neighbours at the Star and Garter 
for some weeks, and we have seen him several times, to thank us 
for our inquiries after the poor Queen and Princes while they were 



1847-52] PETERSHAM SCHOOL 103 

so ill. Only think how strange to see this great King, this busy- 
plotter for the glory of his own family and the degradation of 
England, taking refuge in that very England, and sitting in the 
house of one of those very Ministers whom he had been so proud 
of outwitting, giving the history of " ma chute." This he did 
with great bitterness ; representing the whole French nation as a 
mass of place-hunters, without patriotism and without gratitude, 
and with no tenderness to Guizot. There is nothing noble and 
touching in his manner or conversation, or I am sure he would 
have inspired me with more pity in his fallen state, in spite of 
many faults as a King.^ 

During the earlier part of 1849, Lord John suffered from 
the effects of overwork, and like most tired statesmen he 
began to think of taking a peerage. On July nth their third 
son, Francis Albert Rollo Russell, was born at Pembroke 
Lodge. The parliamentary recess was an easier period than 
they had known since taking office, and they had time to attend 
to other projects, although the difficulties with Palmerston 
at the Foreign Office were meanwhile coming to a climax. 

In August Lord and Lady John founded a school at 
Petersham, over which she watched with unflagging interest 
till her death. They were amused by the remark of an old 
gentleman in the neighbourhood, who said that to have a 
school at Petersham "would ruin the aristocratic character 
of the village" — education and aristocracy being evidently, 
in his eyes, opposing forces. 

The classes were held at first in a room in the village ; the 
present building was not erected till 1852. 

On August 22nd Lady John wrote in her diary : 

Our little school, which had long been planned, was opened in 
a room in the village the day before Baby's birthday, July loth, 
and goes on well. We celebrated John's birthday last Saturday 
by giving the school-children a tea under the cedar, and a dance 
on the lawn afterwards, and very merry they were. 

In August and September the Prime Minister spent some 

weeks at Balmoral, and wrote as follows on his last day there : 

' In later years Lord and Lady John had much friendly intercourse 
with the Due d'Aumale, son of Louis Philippe, and with the Comte de 
Paris and the Due de Chartres (grandsons of the King), who were neigh- 
bours and welcome visitors at Pembroke Lodge. 



I04 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Lord John Russell to Lady John Russell 

Balmoral, September 6, 1849 
I leave this place to-morrow. . . . No hostess could be more 
charming or more easy than the Queen has been — or more kind 
and agreeable than the Prince, and I shall leave this place with 
increased attachment to them. 

The Queen had been to Ireland in August, and Lord 
Dufferin wrote an interesting account of her visit in a letter 
to Lady John. 

Lord Dufferin to Lady John Russell 

September lo, 1849 
As the newspaper reporters have already described all, nay 
more than was to be seen on the occasion of the Queen's visit to 
Ireland, I need not trouble you with any of my own experiences 
during those auspicious days — suffice it to say that the people were 
frantic with loyalty and enthusiasm. Indeed, I never witnessed so 
touching a sight as when the Queen from her quarter-deck took 
leave of the Irish people. It was a sweet, calm, silent evening, 
and the sun just setting behind the Wicklow mountains bathed all 
things in golden floods of light. Upon the beach were crowded 
in thousands the screaming bother-headed people, full of love and 
devotion for her, her children, and her house, surging to and fro 
like some horrid sea and asking her to come back quick to them, 
and bidding her God-speed. ... It was a beautiful historical 
picture, and one which one thought of for a long time after Queen 
and ships and people had vanished away. I suspect that she too 
must have thought of it that night as she sat upon the deck and 
sailed away into the darkness — and perhaps she wondered as she 
looked back upon the land, which ever has been and still is, the 
dwelling of so much wrong and misery, whether it should be 
written in history hereafter, that in her reign, and under her 
auspices, Ireland first became prosperous and her people con- 
tented. Directly after the Queen's departure, I started on a little 
tour round the West coast, where I saw such sights as could be 
seen nowhere else. The scenery is beautiful and wild. . . . But 
after one has been travelling for a little while in the far West one 
soon loses all thought of the scenery, or the climate, or anything 
else, in astonishment at the condition of the people. I do most 
firmly believe that in no other country under the sun are there to 
be found men so wretched in every respect. . . . All along the 
West coast, from North to South, there has been allowed to 
accumulate on land utterly unable to support them a dense popula- 
tion, the only functions of whose lives have been to produce rent 
and children. Generation after generation have grown up in 



1847-52] LORD DUFFERIN'S LETTER 105 

ignorance and misery, while those who Hved upon the product of 
their labours have laughed and rioted through life as though they 
had not known that from them alone could light and civilization 
descend upon these poor wretches, I had often heard, as every 
one has, of the evils of absenteeism, but till I came and saw its 
effects I had no notion how great a crime it is. . . . They [the 
absentee landowners] thought only of themselves and their own 
enjoyments, they left their people to grow up and multiply like 
brute beasts, they stifled in them by their tyranny all hope and 
independence and desire of advancement, they made them 
cowards and liars, and have now left them to die off from the face 
of the earth. Neither can any one living at a distance have any 
notion of the utter absence of all public spirit among the upper 
classes. . . . Legislation can do nothing when there is nothing 
for it to act upon. Parliament to Ireland is what a galvanic 
battery is to a dead body, and it is in vain to make laws when 
there is no machinery to work them. A people must be worked 
up to a certain point in their dispositions and understandings 
before they can be affected by highly civilized legislation. ... It 
is only individual exertions, and the personal superintendence of 
wise and good men, that can ever drill the Irish people into a 
legislatable state. . . . One or two things, however, seem to me 
pretty certain — ■ 

1. That under proper management the Irish peasant can be 
made anything of. 

2. That, generally speaking, the present class of proprietors 
must and will be swept from off the surface of the earth. 

3. That in the extreme West the surface is overcrowded, but 
not at all so a few miles inland. 

4. That reclaiming waste lands and bogs at present is to throw 
money away. 

I begin to fear I have written a strange rigmarole, but still I 
will send it, for though Irish matters cannot interest you as they 
do me, yet still a letter is always a pleasant thing to receive, even 
only that one may have the satisfaction of looking at the Queen's 
head and breaking the seal. 

The next entry from Lady John's Diary is dated October 9, 
1849. 

After tea John told me that he had informed the Cabinet of 
his plan for the extension of the suffrage — to be proposed next 
session. All looked grave. Sir Charles Wood and Lord 
Lansdowne expressed some alarm. . . . To grant an increase of 
weight to the people of this country when revolutions are taking 
place on all sides, when a timid Ministry would rather seek to 
diminish that which they already have, is to show a noble trust in 
them, of which I believe they will nobly prove themselves worthy; 



io6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Lord John's determination to carry through this measure 
himself, rather than to leave it in the hands of others, was 
afterwards the cause of the first defeat of the Whig Govern- 
ment, 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromhy 

London, February 19, 1850 

The weeks are galloping past so much faster even than usual 
that there is no keeping pace with them. 

I neither read, write, teach, learn, nor do anything — unless 
indeed revising visiting books and writing invitations is to be 
called something. I want to be with my Mama, to be with my 
husband, to be with my children, to be with friends, and to be 
alone, all at the same time. I want to read everything, and to 
write to everybody, and to walk everywhere, in no time at all. 
And what is the result ? Why, that I lose the very power not only 
of doing, but of thinking, to a degree that makes me seriously 
uneasy and unfits me to be a companion to anybody older or 
wiser than Wee-wee, or Baby, whose capacities exactly suit mine. 
All this sounds as if I led a life of bustle, which I do not — but it is 
too full, and there is an end of it. I dare say it is mistaken vanity 
to suppose that if it was emptier I should do anything worthier of 
record in the political, literary, or educational line — and at all 
events it would be hard to find a happier or, I trust, more thankful 
heart than mine, my troubles being in fact the result of many 
blessings. 

The next session opened with the Greek crisis, which 
Greville described as " the worst scrape into which Palmerston 
has ever got himself and his colleagues. The disgust at it here 
is universal with those who think at all about foreign matters : 
it is past all doubt that it has produced the strongest feelings 
of indignation against this country all over Europe, and the 
Ministers themselves are conscious what a disgraceful figure 
they cut, and are ashamed of it." 

Palmerston had ordered the blockade of the Piraeus to 
extort compensation from the Greek Government on behalf 
of Mr. Finlay (afterwards the historian of Greece), whose land 
had been commandeered by the King of Greece for his 
garden, and on behalf of Don Pacifico, a Maltese Jew (and 
therefore a British subject), whose house had been wrecked by 



1847-52] PALMERSTON AND GREECE 107 

an Athenian mob. The Greek Government had been prepared 
to pay compensation in both cases, but not the figure de- 
manded, which turned out, indeed, on investigation, to be 
in gross excess of fair compensation. Palmerston's action 
nearly threw Europe into war ; Russia protested, and France, 
who had offered to mediate, was aggravated by a diplomatic 
muddle to the verge of breaking off negotiations. A vote of 
censure was passed by the Opposition in the House of Lords, 
which had the effect of making Lord John take up the cause 
of Palmerston in the Commons. The question was discussed 
in a famous four days' debate. " It contained," says Mr. 
Herbert Paul, " the finest of all Lord Palmerston's speeches, 
the first great speech of Gladstone, the last speech of Sir 
Robert Peel, and the most elaborate of those forensic 
harangues, delivered successively at the Bar, in the Senate, 
and on the Bench, by the accomplished personage best known 
as Lord Chief Justice Cockburn." Lord John, who was always 
good at a fighting speech, spoke also with great force. Mr. 
Roebuck's motion of confidence in the Ministry was carried, 
but this success was largely due to the fact that a coalition 
between the Peelites and the Protectionists seemed impossible. 
Had it not been carried the Whigs would have resigned, and 
neither of the other two parties feeling strong enough to 
succeed them, they did not oppose in force the motion of 
confidence. 

The day after Peel made his speech he was thrown 
from his horse on Constitution Hill, and on July 2nd he 
died. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

June 20, 1850 

. . . Day of great political excitement. After dinner I took 
John to the House and have utterly regretted since that I did 
not go up to hear him — for he made what I am quite sure you 
and Ralph will agree with me and all whom I have yet spoken to, 
was a most perfect answer ; and I should have dearly liked to hear 
the volleys of cheering which he so well deserved. Now we shall 
either go out with honour or stay in with triumph — welcome 
either. 



io8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Lord Charles Russell^ to Lady John Russell 

July 13, 1850 
As you were not here to hear John move the monument [of Sir 
Robert Peel], I must tell you that he succeeded in the opinion of 
all. Dizzy has just, in passing my chair, said, " Well, Lord John 
did that to perfection. My friends were nervous, I was not ; it 
was a difficult subject, but one peculiarly fitted for Lord John. 
He did as I was sure he would, and pleased all those who sit 
about me." 

Pembroke Lodge, July 17, 1850 

For the first time since the session began John spent a whole 
weekday here, and such a fine one that we enjoyed it thoroughly. 
Our roses are still in great beauty, but it is a drying blaze. 
In the evening we cried over '* David Copperlield " till we were 
ashamed. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Melgund 

MiNTO, October 5, 1850 
This whole morning having been spent fox-hunting, and the 
afternoon doing something else, I do not exactly remember what, 
I am obliged to write to you at the forbidden time (after dinner), 
instead of making myself agreeable. What a quantity I have to 
say to you, and what a pity to say it all by letter, or, rather, to say 
a very small part of it by letter, instead of having you here, as I 
had hoped and looked forward to, enjoying daily gloomy talks 
with you, such as we always find ourselves indulging in when we 
are together. . . . Though I have scarcely walked a step about the 
place from obedience to doctors, I have driven daily with Mama — 
and such lovely drives ! Oh ! the place is in such beauty. I 
think its greatest beauty — the trees red, yellow, green, brown, of 
every shade, so that each one is seen separately, and the too great 
thickness on the rocks is less perceived. This was one of the 
brightest mornings, and you know what a hunt is on the rocks 
when the sun shines bright, and the rocks look whiter against a 
blue sky, and men and horses and hounds place themselves in the 
most picturesque positions, and horns and tally-hos echo all round, 
and everybody, except the fox, is in spirits. The gentlemen had 
no sport, but the ladies a great deal, and I saw more foxes than I 
had ever seen before. . . . 

Our time here is slipping away fearfully fast — there are so 
many impossibilities to be done. I am hungry to see every 
brother and sister comfortably and alone, and hungry to be out 
all day seeing every old spot and old face in the place and 
village, and hungry to be always with Papa and Mama, and 

' Lord John's stepbrother. 



i847~52] PAPAL BULL 109 

hungry to read all the books in the library — and none of these 
hungers can be satisfied. We are all much pleased with Mr. 
Chichester Fortescue. He is agreeable and gentlemanlike and 
good, and Lotty and Harriet got on very well with him, which is 
more than I am doing with my letter, for they are singing me out 
of all my little sense — '' Wha's at the window " was distracting 
enough, but "Saw ye the robber" ten times worse. 



In September the Papal Bull dividing England into Roman 
Catholic sees threw the country into a state of needless excite- 
ment. The year had been a very critical one for the Church 
of England. The result of the Gorham case, which marked 
the failure of the High Church clergy to get their own way 
within the Church, hastened the secession to Rome of 
Manning, James Hope, and other well-known men. Lord 
John's letter to the Bishop of Durham, in which he expressed 
his own strong Protestant and Erastian principles, increased his 
popularity; but it was unfortunate in its effect. " It encouraged 
the bigoted alarmist outcries which had been started by the 
Papal Bull, although his own letter differed in tone from such 
protests. The Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, which the Govern- 
ment brought forward in response to popular feeling, seems 
to have been one of the idlest measures that ever wasted the 
time of Parliament. It remained a dead-letter from the day 
it passed, yet at the time no Minister had a chance of leading 
the country who was not prepared to support it. 

The Budget made the Ministry unpopular at the beginning 
of the session ; and in February Mr. Locke King succeeded in 
passing, with the help of the Radicals, a measure for the 
extension of the franchise, in spite of opposition from the 
Government. Lord John had a measure of his own of a 
similar nature in view, as we have seen ; but, in spite of his 
assurance that he would introduce it during the following 
year, the Radicals voted against him on Mr. King's motion, 
and on February 20th he resigned. 

The state of parties was such that no rival coalition was 
possible. Lord Stanley was for widening the franchise, but 
being a Protectionist he could not work with the Peelites ; 
while Lord Aberdeen would not consent to the Ecclesiastical 



no LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Titles Bill, and was impossible as a leader so long as the anti- 
Catholic hubble-bubble continued. Lord John was therefore 
compelled to resume office. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Pembroke Lodge, November 22, 1850 

I am very glad you and Ralph liked John's letter to the Bishop 
of Durham. It was necessary for him to speak out, and having 
all his life defended the claims of the Roman Catholics to perfect 
toleration and equality of civil rights with the other subjects of the 
Queen, I should hardly have expected that they would take offence 
because he declares himself a Protestant and a despiser of the 
superstitious imitation of Roman Catholic ceremonies by clergymen 
of the Church of England. Such, however, has not been the case : 
and Ireland especially, excited by her priests, has taken lire at the 
whole letter, and most of all at the word " mummeries." The 
wisest and most moderate of them, however, here, and in Ireland 
with Archbishop Murray I hope at their head, will do what they 
can to put out the flame. No amount of dislike to any creed can, 
happily, for a moment shake one's conviction that complete 
toleration to every creed and conviction, and complete charity to 
each one of its professors, is the only right and safe rule — the only 
one which can make consistency in religious matters possible at 
all times and on all occasions. Otherwise it might be shaken by 
the new proofs of the insidious, corrupting, anti-truthful nature 
and effects of the Roman Catholic belief. 

They have shown themselves for ages past in the character 
and conditions of the countries where it reigns, and now the 
Pope's foolish Bull is the signal for double-dealing and ingratitude 
among his spiritual subjects — and consequently for anger and 
intolerance among Protestants — wrong, but not quite inexcusable. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Pembroke Lodge, November 29, 1850 

Far from wondering at your vacillations of opinion about John's 
letter, both he and I felt, on the first appearance of Wiseman's 
pastoral letter, that the whole scheme was so ridiculous, the affec- 
tation of power so contemptible, the change of Vicars Apostolic 
into Bishops and Archbishops, so impotent for evil to Protestants, 
while it might possibly be of use to Roman Catholics, that ridicule 
and contempt were the only fit arms for the occasion. But when 
he came to consider the chief cause of the measure — that is, the 
great and growing evil of Tractarianism — of an established clergy 
becoming daily less efficient for the wants of their parishioners. 



1847-52] DURHAM LETTER 11 1 

and more at variance with the laity and with the spirit of the 
Church to which they outwardly belong ; when the whole Pro- 
testant country showed its anger or fear ; when such a man as the 
Bishop of Norwich (Hinds), a man so tolerant as to be called by 
the intolerant a latitudinarian, came to him to represent the 
necessity for some expression of opinion on the part of the 
Government, and the immense evils that would result from 
the want of such an expression ; when, after a calm survey of the 
state of religion throughout the country, he thought he saw that it 
was in his power to prevent the ruin of the Church of England, 
not by assuming popular opinions, but merely by openly avowing 
his own — then, and not till then, he wrote his letter — then, and 
not till then, I felt he was right to do so. 

It has quieted men's fears with regard to the Pope, and directed 
them towards Tractarianism. And we are told that a great many 
(I think one hundred) of the clergy omitted some of their 
" mummeries" on the following Sunday. That word was perhaps 
ill-chosen, and he is willing to say so — but I doubt it. Suppose 
he had omitted it, some other would have been laid hold of as 
offensive to men sincere in their opinions, however mistaken he 
may think them. 

The letter was a Protestant one, and could not give great 
satisfaction to Roman Catholics, except such as Lord Beaumont, 
who prefers the Queen to the Pope. John has all his life showed 
himself a friend to civil and religious liberty, especially that of 
the Roman Catholics — and would gladly never have been called 
upon to say a word that they could take as an insult to their creed. 
But it was a moment in which he had to choose between a 
temporary offence to a part of their body and the deserved loss 
of the confidence of the Protestant body, to which he heart and 
soul belongs. He could scarcely declare his opinion of the 
Tractarians, who remain in a Church to which they no longer 
belong, without indirectly giving offence to Roman Catholics. 
But it is against their practices that his strong disapprobation 
is declared, and of the mischief of those practices I dare say you 
have no idea. I believe many of them, most of them, to be as 
pious and excellent men as ever existed ; but their teaching is 
not likely to make others as pious and excellent as themselves ; 
and their remaining in the Church obliges them to a secrecy 
and hesitation in their teaching that is worse than the teaching 
itself, which would disappear if they became honest Dissenters. 
I could write pages more upon the subject but have no time, 
and I will only beg you not to confound John's letter with the 
bigotry and intolerance of many speeches at many meetings. 
I am keeping the collection of letters, addresses, etc., that he 
has received on the subject — a curious medley, being from all 
ranks and degrees of men, some really touching, some laughable. 



112 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Lady y-ohn Russell to Lady Maty Abercromby 

London, February 11, 1851 

I wonder what you will think of John's speech last Friday. 
I am quite surprised at the approbation it meets with here — not 
that I do not think it deserved, for surely it was a fine high- 
minded one, and at the same time one at no word of which a 
Roman Catholic, as such, could take offence — but so many people 
thought more ought to be done, and so many others that nothing 
ought to be done, that I expected nothing but grumbling. How- 
ever, the speech is by most persons distinguished from the measure. 
I have not yet quite succeeded in persuading myself, or being 
persuaded, that we might not have let the whole thing alone ; 
treating an impertinence as an impertinence, to be met by ridicule 
or indignation as each person might incline, but not by legislation. 
This being my natural and I hope foolish impulse, I rejoice that 
the Bill is so mild that nobody can consider it as an infringement 
of the principle of religious liberty, but rather a protest against 
undue interference in temporal affairs by Pope, Prelate, or Priest 
of any denomination. Lizzy and I went to the House last night. 
I never heard John speak with more spirit and effect. Do not you 
in your quiet beautiful Nervi look with amazement at the whirl 
of politics and parties in which we live ? I am sometimes ashamed 
of the time I consume in writing invitations and other matters 
connected with party-giving — quite as much as John takes to 
think of speeches, which affect the welfare of so many thousands. 
But after all it is a part of the same trade, one which, though 
most dangerous to all that is best in man and woman, may, I trust, 
be followed in safety by those who see the dangers. I am sure I 
see them. God grant we may both escape them. 

In a letter written to Lady Mary Abercromby, more than 
two years before, she had expressed her feelings with regard 
to religious ceremonies. It is interesting that the word mum- 
meries, which excited so much indignation in Lord John's 
Durham letter, occurs in this letter. 

On January 13, 1848, she wrote : 

Many thanks to you for the interesting account of the great 
ceremony on Christmas Day in St. Peter's, and of your own 
feelings about it. I believe that whatever is meant as an act of 
devotion to God, or as an acknowledgment of His greatness and 
glory, whether expressed by the simple prayer of a Covenanter 
on the hill-side or by the ceremonies of a Catholic priesthood, 



1847-52] RUSSIA AND ENGLAND 113 

or even by the prostrations of a Mahometan, or by the self-torture 
of a Hindoo, may and ought to inspire us with respect and with 
a devout feehng, at least when the worshippers themselves are 
pious and sincere. Otherwise, indeed, if the mummery is more 
apparent than the solemnity, I do not see how respect can be felt 
by those accustomed to a pure worship, the words and meaning 
of which are clear and applicable to rich and poor, high and 
low. . . . 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

London, April 11, 1851 

I wonder what you will do with regard to teaching religion to 
Maillie when she is older. I am daily more and more convinced of 
the folly, or worse than folly, the mischief, of stuffing children's 
heads with doctrines some of which we do not believe ourselves 
(though we may think we do), others which we do not understand, 
while their hearts remain untouched. . . . Old as Johnny is, he 
does not yet go to church. I see with pain, but cannot help 
seeing, that from the time a child begins to go to church, the 
truth and candour of its religion are apt to suffer. . . . Oh, how 
far we still are from the religion of Christ ! How unwilling to 
believe that God's ways are not our ways, nor His thoughts our 
thoughts ! How willing to bring them down to suit not what is 
divine, but what is earthly, in ourselves ! Yet, happily, we do not 
feel or act in consistency with all that we repeat as a lesson upon 
the subject of our faith — for man cannot altogether crush the 
growth of the soul given by God — and I trust and believe a better 
time is coming, when freedom of thought and of word will be 
as common as they are now uncommon. 

In May Lady John writes of a dinner-party in London 
where she had a long conversation with the Russian Ambas- 
sador (Baron Brunow) on the Governments of Russia and 
England ; she ended by hoping for a time " when Russia will 
be more like this country than it is now, to which he answered 
with a start, and lifting up his hands, ' God forbid ! May I 
never live to see Russia more like this country ! God forbid, 
my dear Lady Joan I ' " 

To follow the events which led to the fall of the Ministry it 
is necessary to look abroad. The power of the Whigs in 
the House of Commons, such as it was, was the result of 
inability of Tories to combine, owing to their differences 
concerning Free Trade. The strength of Lord John's 



114 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

Ministry in the country depended largely upon the foreign 
policy of Palmerston, who was disliked and mistrusted by the 
Court. While Palmerston was defending his abrupt, high- 
handed policy towards Greece in the speech which made him 
the hero of the hour, a war was going on between Denmark 
and Schleswig-Holstein, in which the Prince Consort himself 
was much interested. It was a question as to whether 
Schleswig-Holstein should be permitted to join the German 
Federation. Holstein was a German fief, Schleswig was a 
Danish fief ; unfortunately an old law linked them together in 
some mysterious fashion, as indissolubly as Siamese twins. 
Both wanted to join the Federation. Holstein had a good 
legal claim to do as it liked in this respect, Schleswig a bad 
one ; but the law declared that both must be under the same 
government. Prussia interfered on behalf of the duchies ; 
England, Austria, France, and the Baltic Powers joined in 
declaring that the Danish monarchy should not be divided. 

The Prince Consort had Prussian sympathies, and he there- 
fore disapproved of the strong line which Palmerston took up 
in this matter. It was not only Palmerston's policy, however, 
but the independence with which he was accustomed to carry 
it out, which annoyed the Court. He was a bad courtier ; he 
domineered over princelings and kings abroad, and his 
behaviour to his own Sovereign did not in any way resemble 
Disraeli's. He not only " never contradicted, only sometimes 
forgot" ; on the contrary, he often omitted to tell the Queen 
what he was doing, and consequently she found herself in a 
false position. 

At last the following peremptory reproof was addressed 
to him : 

Queen Victoria to Lord John Russell i^ 

Osborne, August 12, 1850 

. The Queen requires, first, that Lord Palmerston will dis- 
tinctly state what he proposes in a given case, in order that the Queen 
may know as distinctly to what she has given her royal sanction ; 
secondly, having once given her sanction to a measure, that it 

• " Letters of Queen Victoria," vol. ii, chap. xix. 



1847-52] QUEEN AND PALMERSTON 115 

be not arbitrarily altered or modified by the Minister. Such an 
act she must consider as failing in sincerity towards the Crown, 
and justly to be visited by the exercise of her constitutional right 
of dismissing that Minister. She expects to be kept informed 
of what passes between him and Foreign Ministers before 
important decisions are taken, based upon that intercourse : to 
receive foreign dispatches in good time ; and to have the drafts 
for her approval sent to her in sufficient time to make herself 
acquainted with their contents before they must be sent off. The 
Queen thinks it best that Lord John Russell should show this 
letter to Lord Palmerston. 

Palmerston apologized and promised amendment, but he 
did not resign, nor did the Prime Minister request him to 
do so. His foreign policy had hitherto vigorously befriended 
liberty on the Continent, and although the Queen and Prince 
Consort never strained the constitutional limits of the preroga- 
tive, these limits are elastic and there was a general feeling 
among Liberals that the Court might acquire an over- 
whelming influence in diplomacy, and that certainly at the 
moment the Prince Consort's sympathies were too largely 
determined by his relationship to foreign royal families. It is 
clear, however, that as long as the Crown is an integral part of 
the Executive, the Sovereign must have the fullest information 
upon foreign affairs. Palmerston had gone a great deal too 
far. 

Lady John Russell to Lady 'Mary Abercromby 

London, March 14, 1851 

We have now heard from you several times since the crisis,'^ 
but not since you knew of our reinstatement in place and power, 
toil and trouble. ... I should hardly have thought it possible that 
Ralph, hearing constantly from Lord Palmerston, had not dis- 
covered the change that has come over him since last year, when 
he took his stand and won his victory on the principles that 
became a Whig Minister, of sympathy with the constitutionalists 
and antipathy to the alDsolutists all over Europe. Ever since 
that great debate he has gradually retreated from those principles. 
... I am not apt to be politically desponding, but the one thing 
which now threatens us is the loss of confidence of the House 
of Commons and the country. . . . 

' The defeat of the Government on Mr. Locke King's motion for the 
equalization of the county and borough franchise. 



ii6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

She was not right, however, in her estimate of the dangers 
which threatened the Ministry ; they came from the Foreign 
Office and the Court, not from the Commons. 

Kossuth, the leader of the Hungarian Revolution, had been 
received in England with great enthusiasm. He made a series 
of fiery speeches against the Austrian and Russian Govern- 
ments, urging that in cases in which foreign Powers interfered 
with the internal politics of a country, as they had done in the 
case of the Revolution in Hungary, outside nations should 
combine to prevent it. This was thoroughly in harmony with 
Palmerston's foreign policy. He wished to receive Kossuth at 
his house, which would have been tantamount to admitting 
to a hostile attitude towards Austria and Russia, who were 
nominally our friends. Lord John dissuaded him from doing 
this ; but he did receive deputations at the Foreign Office, 
who spoke of the Emperors of Austria and Russia as " odious 
and detestable assassins." The Queen was extremely angry. 

Windsor Castle, Novembet 13, 1851 

The Queen talked long with me about Lord Palmerston and 
about Kossuth. 

After accusing Lord Palmerston of every kind of fault and 
folly, public and private, she said several times, " I have the 
very worst opinion of him." I secretly agreed with her in much 
that she said of him, but openly defended him when I thought 
her unjust. I told her of his steadiness in friendship and 
constant kindness in word and deed to those he had known 
in early life, however separated from him by time and station. 
She did not believe it, and said she knew him to be quite 
wanting in feeling. This turaed out to mean that his political 
enmities outlasted the good fortune of his enemies. She said if he 
took the part of the revolutionists in some countries he ought 
in all, and that while he pretended great compassion for the 
oppressed Hungarians and Italians, he would not care if the Schles- 
wig-Holsteiners were all drowned. I said this was too common 
a failing with us all, etc. I allowed that I wished his faults 
were not laid on John's shoulders, and John's merits given to him, 
as has often been the case — and that it was a pity he sometimes 
used unnecessarily provoking language, but I would not grant 
that England was despised and hated by all other European 
countries. 



1847-52] DEFEAT OF GOVERNMENT 117 

The Kossuth incident was soon followed by a graver one. 
On December i, 1851, Louis Napoleon carried out his coup 
d'etat. The Ministry determined to maintain a strict neutrality 
in the matter, and a short dispatch was sent to Lord Normanby 
instructing him "to make no change in his relations to the 
French Government." When this dispatch was shown to the 
French Minister, he replied, a little nettled no doubt by 
the suggestion that England considered herself to be stretching 
a point in recognising the Emperor, that he had already heard 
from their Ambassador in London that Lord Palmerston 
fully approved of the change. In a later dispatch to Lord 
Normanby, which had not been shown either to the Queen or 
to the Prime Minister, Palmerston repeated his own opinion. 
Now this was precisely the kind of conduct for which he had 
been reproved : in consequence he was asked to resign. When 
it came to explanations before Parliament, Palmerston, to the 
surprise of everybody, made a meek, halting defence of his 
independent conduct. But he bided his time, and when the 
Government brought in a Militia Bill, intended to quiet the 
invasion scare which the appearance of another Napoleon on 
the throne of France had started, he proposed an amendment 
which they could not accept, and carried it against them. 
Lord John Russell resigned and Lord Derby undertook to 
form a Government. 

Lady John wrote afterwards the following recollections of 
this crisis : 



The breach between John and Lord Palmerston was a calamity 
to the country, to the Whig party, and to themselves. And 
although it had for some months been a threatening danger on the 
horizon, I cannot but feel that there was accident in its actual 
occurrence. Had we been in London, or at Pembroke Lodge, and 
not at Woburn Abbey at the time, they would have met and 
talked over the subjects of their difference. Words spoken might 
have been equally strong, but would have been less cutting than 
words written, and conciliatory expressions on John's part would 
have led the way to promises on Lord Palmerston's to avoid com- 
mitting his colleagues in future, as he had done in the case of the 
coup d'etat, and also to avoid any needless risk of irritating the 
Queen by neglect in sending dispatches to the Palace. It was 



ii8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

characteristic of my husband to bear patiently for a long while 
with difficulties, opposition, perplexities, doubts raised by those 
with whom he acted, listening to them with candour and good 
temper, and only meeting their arguments with his own ; but, at 
last, if he failed to convince them, to take a sudden resolution — 
either yielding to them entirely or breaking with them altogether 
— from which nothing could shake him, but which, on looking back 
in after years, did not always seem to him the best course. My 
father, who knew him well, once said to me, half in joke and half 
in earnest : " Your husband is never so determined as when he is 
in the wrong." It was a relief to him to have done with hesitation 
and be resolved on any step which this very anxiety to have done 
with hesitation led him to believe a right one at the moment. 
This habit of mind showed itself in private as in public matters, 
and his children and I were often startled by abrupt decisions on 
home affairs announced very often by letter. 

In the case of the dismissal of Lord Palmerston, there was but 
Lord Palmerston himself who found fault. The rest of the 
Cabinet were unanimous in approbation. But there was not one 
of them whose opinions on foreign policy were, in John's mind, 
worth weighing against those of Lord Palmerston. He and John 
were always in cordial agreement on the great lines of foreign 
policy, so far as I remember, except on Lord Palmerston's unlucky 
and unworthy sanction of the coii^p d'etat. 

They two kept up the character of England as the sturdy 
guardian of her own rights against other nations and the champion 
of freedom and independence abroad. They did so both before 
and after the breach of 1851, which was happily closed in the 
following year, when they were once more colleagues in office. On 
matters of home policy Lord Palmerston remained the Tory 
he had been in his earlier days, and this was the cause 
of many a trial to John. Indeed, it was a misfortune to him 
throughout his public career that his colleagues almost to a man 
hung back when he would have gone forward ; and many a time 
he came home dispirited from a Cabinet at which he had been 
alone — or with only the support of my father, who always stood 
stoutly by him while he remained Cabinet Minister — in the wish to 
bring before Parliament measures worthy of the Whig banner of 
Civil and Religious Liberty, Progress and Reform. Nothing could 
exceed John's patience under the criticisms of his colleagues, who 
were, most of them, also his friends, some of them very dear friends 
— nothing could exceed his readiness to admit and listen to 
difference of opinion from them ; but it was trying to find the 
difference always in one direction, and that a direction hardly 
consistent with the character of a Whig Ministry. 

The spirit which pervaded the foreign policy of Lord John 



1847-52] LITERARY FRIENDS 119 

Russell is shown in a letter from him to Queen Victoria dated 
December 29, 185 1^ : 

The grand rule of doing to others as we wish that they should 
do unto us is more applicable than any system of political science. 
The honour of England does not consist in defending every 
English officer or English subject, right or wrong, but in taking 
care that she does not infringe the rules of justice, and that they 
are not infringed against her. 

Lord and Lady John often regretted that the duties of 
political life prevented them from having fuller intercourse 
with literary friends. There are short entries in her diaries 
mentioning the visits of distinguished men and women, but 
she seldom had time to write more than a few words. Her 
diaries — like her letters — were written with marvellous rapidity, 
and were, of course, meant for herself alone. In March, 
1852, she writes : "Thackeray came to read his 'Sterne' and 
' Goldsmith ' to us — very interesting quiet evening." And a 
little later at Pembroke Lodge : " Dickens came to luncheon 
and stayed to dinner. He was very agreeable — and more than 
agreeable — made us feel how much he is to be liked." Rogers 
they also saw occasionally, and the letter which follows is 
a reply to an invitation to Pembroke Lodge. The second 
letter refers to a volume of poems in manuscript, written by 
Lady John and illustrated by Lord John's stepdaughter, Mrs. 
Drummond. He had lent it to Rogers. 

My dear Lady John, — Yes ! yes ! yes ! A thousand thanks 
to you both ! I need not say how delighted I shall be to avail 
myself of your kindness. I would rather share a crust with you 
and Lord John in your Paradise then sup in the Apollo with 
Lucullus himself — yes — though Cicero and Ponipey were to be of 
the party. 

Yours most sincerely, 

Samuel Rogers 

Mr. Samuel Rogers to Lord ^ohn Russell 

April 15, 1852 

My dear Friend, — How could you entrust me with anything 
so precious, so invaluable, that when I leave it I run back to see if 

' " Letters of Queen Victoria/' vol. ii, chap. xx. 



I20 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

it is lost ? The work of two kindred minds which nor time nor 
chance could sever, long may it live a monument of all that 
is beautiful, and long may they live to charm and to instruct when 
I am gone and forgotten. 

Yours ever, 

S. R. 

The next entry from Lady John's diary is dated March 
14, 1852 : 

Yesterday John read a ballad in Punch giving a very 
unfavourable review of his conduct in dismissing Lord Palmerston, 
in bringing forward Reform — indeed, in almost all he has done in 
office. He felt this more than the attacks of graver and less 
independent papers, and said, *' That's hard upon a man who has 
Worked as I have for Reform " ; but the moment of discouragement 
passed away, and he walked up and down the room repeating 
Milton's lines with the spirit and feeling of Milton : 

" Yet bate I not a jot of heart or hope, 
But steer right onward." 



PEMBROKE LODGE 
Appendix to Chapter VI 

My brother and I have here added a few recollections of 

our old home. 

A. R. 

Pembroke Lodge, an old-fashioned house, long and low, surrounded 
by thickly wooded grounds, stood on the ridge of the hill in Richmond 
Park overlooking the Thames Valley and a wide plain beyond. It was 
approached by a drive between ancient oaks, limes, and evergreens, and 
at the entrance was a two-roomed thatched cottage, long occupied by a 
hearty old couple employed on the place, so careful and watchful that an 
amusing incident occurred one day when our father and mother were 
away from home. A lady and gentleman who were walking in the Park 
called at the Lodge, and asked for permission to walk through the grounds. 
The old lodge-keeper refused, saying she could not give access to strangers 
during the absence of the family. The lady then told her they were 
friends of Lord and Lady John, but still the old guardian of the place 
remained suspicious and obdurate ; till, to her surprise and discomfiture, 
it came out that the visitors to whom she had so sturdily refused admission 
were no other than Queen Victoria and Prince Albert walking incognito 
in the Park. 

Just outside the Lodge the Crystal Palace on the height of Sydenham 
could be seen glittering in the rays of the setting sun. In front of the 
house, eastward, were two magnificent poplars, one lOO feet, the other about 
96 feet high, rich and ample in foliage, and most delicately expressive of 
every kind of wind and weather. They could be seen with a telescope 
from Hindhead, about thirty miles south-west. Grand old oaks, of seven 
hundred to a thousand years, grew near the house and made plentiful 
shade ; southwards the grass under them was scarcely visible in May for 
the glorious carpet of wild hyacinths, all blue and purple in the chequered 
sunlight. Nearly every oak had its name and place in the affection of 
young minds. There were also many fine beech-trees in the grounds. 
On the western slopes were masses of primroses and violets, also wild 
strawberries. West and south, down the hill, was a wilderness, the 
delight of children, untended and unspoiled, where birds of many kinds 
built their nests, where squirrels, rabbits, hedgehogs, weasels, snakes, 
wood-pigeons, turtle-doves, owls, and other life of the woods had never 
been driven out, and where visitors hardly ever cared to penetrate. 
Outside, in Petersham Park, was a picturesque thatched byre where the 
cows were milked. Petersham Park was then quiet and secluded, before 
the time came for its invasion by London school treats. 

East of the house was a long lawn, secluded from the open Park by 
a beautiful, wildly growing hedge of gorse, berberis, bramble, hawthorn, 
and wild roses. Further north was a bowling-green, surrounded by 
hollies, laburnums, lilacs, rhododendrons, and forest trees ; at one end 
was a rose-trellis and a raised flower garden. The effect of this bright 



122 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1847-52 

flower garden with its setting of green foliage and flowering shrubs, and 
majestic old trees surrounding the whole, was very beautiful. At one end, 
shaded by two cryptomereas, planted by our father — said by Sir Joseph 
Hooker to be among the finest in England — was a long verandah whece 
our mother often sat in summer with her basket of books, and in winter 
spread oatmeal for the birds, which grew very tame and would eat out 
of her hand. Close by was a picturesque old thatched summer-house, 
covered with roses ; on each side were glades of chestnut, hornbeam, and 
lime trees, and looking westward Windsor Castle could be seen on the 
far horizon. 

Near the house was a noble cedar, with one particularly fine bough 
under the shade of which the Petersham School children and the " Old 
Scholars " had their tea on festive occasions, followed by merry games in 
the grounds. The view from the house and the West walk, and also 
from King Henry's Mount, was most beautiful, especially in the spring 
and autumn, with the varied and harmonious tints of the wooded fore- 
ground fading away into the soft blue distance. 

It was a glorious Park to live in. The great oaks, the hawthorns, the 
tall dense bracken, the wide expanses of grass, the herds of red and fallow 
deer, not always undisturbed, made it a paradise for young people. The 
boys delighted in the large ponds, full of old carp and tench, with dace 
and roach, perch, gudgeons, eels, tadpoles, sticklebacks, and curious 
creatures of the weedy bottom. There was the best of riding over the 
smooth grass in the open sunny expanses or among the quiet and shady 
glades. Combe Wood, a little south of the Park, was then an island of 
pure country, quite unfrequented, and an occasional day there was a treat 
for all. 

Pembroke Lodge, the house, was entered by a porch overhung with 
wistaria ; the walls on each side were covered with laburnums and roses ; 
a long trellised arch of white roses led to the south lawn, which was 
sheltered from the east by holly, lilacs, and a very fine Crataegus. From 
here was one of the loveliest views in the place, for our mother had made 
a wide opening under the arched bough of a fine elm-tree which 
stood like a grand old sentinel in the foreground. The bow room on the 
south side of the house was occupied by our father during his later years. 
Here stood the statue of Italy given by grateful Italians and the silver 
statuette given by the ladies of Bedford in recognition of Reform. The 
West room next the dining-room had been our father's study during many 
of his most strenuous years of office. The floor was heaped high with 
pyramids of despatch- boxes. One day some consternation was caused by 
our pet jackdaw, who had found his way in and pulled off all the labels, 
no doubt intending, in mischievous enjoyment, to tear to shreds 
despatches of European importance. 

Above the bow room was our mother's bedroom ; the view from here 
was exceedingly beautiful, both near and far, and she was never tired of 
standing at the open window looking at the loveliness around her, and 
listening to the happy chorus of birds — and to the nightingales answer- 
ing each other, and singing day and night, apparently never weary of 
trying to gladden the world with their glorious melody. 

It was indeed impossible to have a happier or more perfect home ; 
the freedom, the outdoor life, the games and fun, in which our father and 
mother joined in their rare moments of leisure ; the hours of reading and 
talk with them on the high and deep things of life — all this, and much 
more that cannot be expressed, forms a background in the memory of 
life deeply treasured and ineffaceable. 



CHAPTER VII 

1852-55 

ALTHOUGH the Russell Ministry had been defeated 
upon the Militia Bill ("my tit-for-tat with John 
Russell," as Palmerston called it), the victors were very un- 
likely to hold office for long. In spite of Disraeli's praise 
of Free Trade during the General Election, a right-about 
surprising and disconcerting to his colleagues, the returns left 
the strength of parties much as they had been before. The 
Conservatives did not lose ground, but they did not gain it ; 
they remained stronger than any other single party, but much 
weaker than Whigs, Peelites, and Irish combined. When 
Parliament met it was obvious that they would soon be 
replaced in office by some kind of coalition. Defeat came 
on Disraeli's Budget. The question remained, who could now 
undertake to amalgamate the various political groups, which, 
except in Opposition, had shown so little stable cohesion ? 
Since the downfall of the Derby Government had been the 
work of a temporary alliance between Peelites and Whigs, 
the Queen sent for representatives of both parties ; for Lord 
Aberdeen as the leader of Peel's followers and for Lord 
Lansdowne as the representative of the Whigs. Naturally 
she did not wish to summon Palmerston after what had 
happened ; and to have charged Lord John, the other Whig 
leader, with the formation of a Ministry would have widened 
the discrepancies within the Whig party itself ; for Lord John 
was unpopular with the Protestant Nonconformist section of 
the party, who were indignant with him for not strictly 
enforcing the Ecclesiastical Titles Act, and he had alienated 

123 



124 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

the numerous believers in Palmerston by having forced him 
to resign. Lord Lansdowne was universally respected, and 
since he belonged to the rear-guard of the Whig party there 
seemed a better chance of his coalescing with the Con- 
servatives. When he declined, pleading gout and old age, the 
task devolved upon Lord Aberdeen, who accepted the Queen's 
commission knowing that Palmerston was willing to take 
office and work withf though never again (he said) under,^ 
Lord John. It was most important that both the leaders of 
the Whig party, Palmerston and Russell, should come into the 
Cabinet ; for if either stayed outside a coalition, which by its 
Conservative tendencies already excluded Radicals of influence 
like Cobden and Bright, it could not have counted upon steady 
Whig support. Would Lord John consent to take office ? 
Upon his decision depended, in Lord Aberdeen's opinion, the 
success or failure of the coalition. He had some talk with 
Lord John before accepting the Queen's commission, which 
persuaded him that he could rely upon Lord John's consent ; 
but it is clear that at that time Lord John did not consider the 
matter decided. 



Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

London, December 24, 1852 

God grant our present good accounts may continue, [Lady 
Minto had been and was then alarmingly ill.] The two last letters 
have made me as little unhappy as is possible, considering how 
much there is still to dread. 

Whenever my thoughts are not with Mama, they are wearying 
themselves to no purpose in threading the maze of ravelled 
politics, or rather political arrangements, in which we are living. 
Since I have been in public life, I never spent a week of such 
painful public anxiety. When I say that the possibility of John 
taking office under Lord Aberdeen was always an odious one to 
me, and one which seemed next to an impossibility, don't for one 
moment suppose that I say so on the ground of personal claims 
and personal ambition, which I hold to be as wrong and selfish in 

' Although he asserted at the time that he would never serve under 
Lord John again, yet it appears that he was the only one of Lord John's 
colleagues who was willing to serve under him, when Lord John attempted 
to succeed Lord Aberdeen. Morley's " Life of Gladstone," vol. i, p. 531. 



1852-55] ABERDEEN MINISTRY 125 

politics as in everything else. And I shall feel a positive pleasure, 
far above that of seeing him first, in seeing him give so undoubted 
a proof of disinterestedness and patriotism as consenting to be 
second, if that were all. But oh, the danger of other sacrifices — 
sacrifices as fatal as that one would be honourable to his name — 
and oh, the infinite shades and grades of want of high motives and 
aims which, at such a time, one is doomed to find out in the 
buzzers who hover round the house — while the honest and pure 
and upright keep away and are silent. At times I almost wish I 
could throw away all that is honest and pure and upright, as 
useless and inconvenient rubbish of which I am half ashamed. I 
never felt more keenly or heavily the immeasurable distance 
between earth and heaven than now, when after the day has been 
spent in listening to the plausibilities of commonplace politicians, 
I open my Bible at night. It is going from darkness into light. 

And now you have had enough of my grumpiness, and I shall 
only add that all has not been pain and mortification. On the 
contrary, some men have come out bright and true as they were 
sure to do, and have shown themselves real friends to John and the 
country, and redeemed the class of politicians from a sweeping 
condemnation which would be most unjust. 

After much hesitation Lord John determined to serve 
under Lord Aberdeen. He was persuaded to do so, in spite 
of strong misgivings, by the Queen, who was anxious to avoid 
the last resort of calling in Palmerston ; her request was backed 
by the appeals of his most trusted political friends. 



Queen Victoria to Lord John Russell 

Osborne, December 19, 1852 

The Queen has to-day charged Lord Aberdeen with the duty 
of forming an Administration, which he has accepted. The 
Queen thinks the moment to have arrived when a popular, efficient, 
and durable Government could be formed by the sincere and 
united efforts of all parties professing Conservative and Liberal 
opinions. The Queen, knowing that this can only be effected by 
the patriotic sacrifice of personal interests and feelings to the 
public, trusts that Lord John Russell will, as far as he is able, give 
his valuable and powerful assistance to the realization of this 
object. 

Lord John's hesitation seems to have been not unnaturally 
interpreted by many contemporaries as the reluctance of an 



126 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

ex-Prime Minister to take a subordinate position, and some 
records of this impression have found their way into history. 
We have Lady John's assurance that " this never for one 
moment weighed with him," and that his hesitation was 
entirely due to " the improbability of agreement in a Cabinet 
so composed, and therefore the probable evil to the country." 
His true feeling was shown by a remark made at that time 
by Lady John, that her husband would not mind being 
" shoeblack to Lord Aberdeen " if it would serve the 
country.! 

It may be pointed out in corroboration that three years 
later Lord John was willing to serve under Palmerston himself, 
both in the House of Commons and the Cabinet, though the 
latter had thwarted him at every turn in the previous Ministry, 
and hardly hoped for such generous support. A man in 
whom scruples of pride were strong emotions would have found 
far greater cause for standing out then, than at this juncture. 
Indeed, such an interpretation of his motives does not agree 
with the impression which Lord John's character leaves on the 
mind. From his reserved speech, shy manner, and uncom- 
municative patience under criticism, from the silent abruptness 
of his decisions, his formidable trenchancy in self-defence 
when openly attacked, and his aloofness from any attempts to 
curry favour with the Press, it may be inferred that his cha- 
racter was a dignified one ; but he was dignified precisely in 
the way which makes such actions as taking a subordinate 
political position particularly easy. He foresaw that his 
position would be one of extreme difficulty, but not — here lay 
his error — that it would prove an impossible one. It must be 
remembered that by subordinating himself he was also in a 
certain measure subordinating his party. The Whigs were 
contributing the majority of votes in the House of Commons, 
and they demanded that they should be proportionately 
powerful in the Cabinet. He was therefore forced to arrogate 
to himself an exceptional position in the Cabinet as the leader 
and representative of what was in fact a separate party. The 
Whigs kept complaining that he did not press their claims to 
* Stuart Reid's " Life of Lord John Russell,' p. 205. 



1852-55] GLADSTONE'S BUDGET 127 

office with sufficient importunity, while the Peelites reproached 
him with refusing to work under his chief Hke every other 
Minister. Whenever he subordinated the claims of the Whigs 
for the sake of working better with Lord Aberdeen, he laid 
himself open to charges of betraying his followers, and when 
he pressed their claims, he was accused of arrogance towards 
his chief. This, however, was a dilemma, the vexations of 
which wore off as places were apportioned and the Ministry 
got to its work ; there was a more fatal incongruity in his 
position. He was technically a subordinate Minister, pledged 
to reform (as Prime Minister he had opposed a Radical Reform 
Bill on the ground that he would introduce his own), and the 
representative of the strongest party, also pledged to reform, 
in a coalition Cabinet anxious for the most part to seize 
the first excuse to postpone it indefinitely. In ordinary 
circumstances, if thwarted by his colleagues he would 
have resigned ; but as it turned out, their excuse for thwart- 
ing him was at the same time the strongest claim on his 
loyalty. They made Crimean difficulties at once an excuse 
for postponing reform and for urging him to postpone his 
resignation. 

At first, however, as far as those who were not behind the 
scenes could see, all went smoothly with the Coalition. The 
work of the session was admirably carried out. Lord John 
entered the Cabinet as Foreign Secretary ; but as the duties of 
that office combined with the leadership of the House of 
Commons were too much for one man, he resigned, remain- 
ing in the Cabinet without office until 1854, when he became 
Colonial Secretary. The great event of the session was 
Gladstone's famous first Budget. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

April 19, 1853 

Gladstone's speech was magnificent, and I think his plan will 
do. ... I think we shall carry this Budget, as Gladstone has put 
it so clearly that hardly a Liberal can vote with Disraeli to put 
him in our place. It rejoices me to be party to a large plan, and 
to have to do with a man who seeks to benefit the country rather 
than to carry a majority by concessions to fear. 



J28 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, April 20, 1853 

I am delighted with Gladstone's Budget. I don't pretend to 
judge of all its details, but such of its proposals as I understand 
are all to my mind, and the spirit and temper of the whole speech 
admirable ; so bold, so benevolent, so mild, so uncompromising, 
I read it aloud to Lizzy and the girls, and we were in the middle 
of it when your letter came telling us how fine it had been. . . . 
Surely you will carry it ? I feel no fear, except of your allowing 
it to be damaged in the carrying. 

Mrs. Gladstone to Lady John Russell 

April, 1853 

My dear Lady John, — I thank you heartily for your very kind 
note. You know well from your own experience how happy I 
must be now. 

We have indeed great reason to be thankful : the approbation 
of such men as your husband is no slight encouragement and no 
slight happiness. I assure you we have felt this deeply. After 
great anxiety one feels more as if in a happy dream than in 
real life and you will not laugh at the relief to me of seeing him 
well after such an effort and after such labour as it has been for 
weeks. . . . 

We have often thought of you in your illness and heard 
of your well-doing with sincere pleasure. 

Once more thanking you, believe me, dear Lady John, 

Yours sincerely, 

Catherine Gladstone 

I must tell you with what comfort and interest I watched 
Lord John's countenance during the speech. 

On March 28, 1853, Lady John's daughter, Mary Agatha, 
was born at Pembroke Lodge. Lady Minto was well 
enough to write a bright and happy letter of congratulation 
on the birth of her granddaughter, but her health was gradually 
failing, and on July 21st she died at Nervi, in Italy. 

Pembroke Lodge, August 3, 1853 

The world is changed to me for ever since I last wrote. My 
dear, dear Mama has left it, and I shall never again see that face 
so long and deeply loved. Tuesday, July 26th, was the day 
we heard. Thursday, July 21st, the day her angel spirit was 
summoned to that happy home where tears are wiped from all 



1852-55] SAMUEL ROGERS 129 

eyes. I pray to think more of her, glorious, happy and at rest, than 
of ourselves. But it is hard, very, very hard to part. O Mama, 
Mama, I call and you do not come. I dream of you, I wake, and 
you are not there. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

MiNTO, August 10, 1853 

You will feel a melancholy pang at the date of the place from 
which I write. It is indeed very sorrowful to see Lord Minto and 
so many of his sons and daughters assembled to perform the last 
duties to her who was the life and comfort of them all. . . . The 
place is looking beautiful, and your mother's garden was never so 
lovely. It is pleasant in all these sorrows and trials to see 
a family so united in affection, and so totally without feelings 
or objects that partake of selfishness or ill-will. 

The old poet Rogers, who had been attached to Lady 
John since her earliest days in London society, now wrote to 
her in her sorrow. His note is worth preserving. He was 
past his ninetieth year when he wrote, and it reveals a side 
of him which is lost sight of in the memoirs of the time, 
where he usually appears as saying many neat things, but few 
kind ones. Mrs. Norton, in a letter to Hayward, gives an 
authentic picture of him at this time. She begins by saying 
that no man ever seemed so important who did so little, even 
said so little : 

" His god was Harmony," she wrote ; " and over his life 
Harmony presided, sitting on a lukewarm cloud. He was not 
the ' poet, sage, and philosopher ' people expected to find he 
was, but a man in whom the tastes (rare fact !) preponderated 
over the passions ; who defrayed the expenses of his tastes as 
other men make outlay for the gratification of their passions ; 
all within the limit of reason. 

"... He was the very embodiment of quiet, from his voice 
to the last harmonious little picture that hung in his hushed 
room, and a curious figure he seemed — an elegant pale watch- 
tower, showing for ever what a quiet port literature and the 
fine arts might offer, in an age of ' progress,' when every one 
is tossing, struggling, wrecking, and foundering on a sea of 
commercial speculation or political adventure ; when people 



130 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

fight over pictures, and if a man does buy a picture, it is with 
the burning desire to prove it is a Raphael to his yielding 
enemies, rather than to point it out with a slow white finger to 
his breakfasting friends." 

Mr. Samuel Rogers to Lady ^ohn Russell 

August 13, 1853 

My dear Friend, — May I break in upon you to say how 
much you have been in my thoughts for the last fortnight ? But I 
was unwilling to interrupt you at such a moment when you must 
have been so much engaged. 

May He who has made us and alone knows what is best for 
us support you under your great affliction. Again and again have 
I taken up my poor pen, but in vain, and I have only to pray that 
God may bless you and yours wherever you go. 

Ever most affectionately yours, 

Samuel Rogers 

In the autumn of 1853 Lord John took his family up to 
Roseneath, in Scotland, which had been lent them by the 
Duke of Argyll. They had been there some weeks, occasion- 
ally making short cruises in the Seamen), which the Com- 
mission of Inland Revenue had placed at their disposal, 
when threatening complications in the East compelled Lord 
John to return to London. The peace of thirty-eight years 
was nearly at an end. 

Roseneath, September 2, 1853 

My poor dear John set off to London, to his and my great 
disappointment. The refusal of the Porte to agree to the Note 
accepted by the Emperor makes the journey necessary. 

Lady John soon followed him. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Elizabeth Romilly 

Pembroke Lodge, October 21, 1853 

My dearest Lizzy, — ... I have never ceased rejoicing at! 
my sudden flight from Roseneath, though its two causes, John's 
cold and the Czar's misdeeds, are unpleasant enough — but his 
presence here is so necessary, so terribly necessary, that neither 
he nor I could have stayed on in peace at Roseneath. . . 
What he has accomplished is a wonder ; and I hope that some 



1852-55] THE EASTERN QUESTION 131 

day somehow everybody will know everything, and wonder at 
his patience and firmness and unselfishness, as I do. ... I trust 
we may be very quiet here for some time, and then one must 
gather com-age for London and the battle of life again. Our quiet 
here will not be without interruption, for there will be early in 
November a week or so of Cabinets, for which we shall go to 
town, and at the end of November Parliament may be obliged to 
meet. . . • 

Your ever affectionate sister, 

Fanny Russell 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, December 9, 1853 

Your letter just come, dearest ... I don't think I am tired by 
colds, but indeed it is true that I think constantly and uneasily of 
your political position, never, never, as to whether this or that 
course will place you highest in the world's estimation. I am 
sure you know all I care about is that you should do what is most 
right in the sight of God. 

It may be well to remind the reader at this point of the 
diplomatic confusions and difficulties which led to the 
Crimean War. The Eastern Question originally grew out 
of a quarrel between France and Russia concerning the 
possession of certain holy places in Palestine ; both the Latin 
and the Greek Church wanted to control them. The Sultan 
had offered to mediate, but neither party had been satisfied by 
his intervention. In the beginning of 1853 it became known 
in England that the Czar was looking forward to the collapse 
of Turkey, and that he had actually proposed to the English 
Ambassador that we should take Crete and Greece, while he 
took the European provinces of Turkey. In Russia, hostility 
to Turkey rose partly from sympathy with the Greek Church, 
which was persecuted in Turkey, and partly from the desire 
to possess an outlet into the Mediterranean. The English 
Ministers naturally would have nothing to do with the 
Czar's proposal to partition Turkey. Russia's attitude 
towards Turkey was attributed to the aggressive motive 
alone. Nicholas then demanded from the Sultan the right 
of protecting the Sultan's Christian subjects himself, and 
when this was refused, he occupied Moldavia and Wallachia 



132 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

with his troops. England's reply was to send a fleet up the 
Dardanelles. 

A consultation of the four great Powers, England, France, 
Austria, and Prussia, for the prevention of war, ended in 
the dispatch of the "Vienna Note," which contained the 
stipulation that the Sultan should protect in future all 
Christians of the Greek Church in his kingdom. The Czar 
accepted the terms of the Note, but the Sultan, instigated 
by Sir Stratford Canning, the British Ambassador at Con- 
stantinople, refused them. The Czar then declared war, 
and though the Turks were successful on the Danube, he 
succeeded in destroying the Turkish fleet at Sinope. This 
success produced the greatest indignation in England and 
France, and in March, 1854, they declared war upon Russia 
together. 

Before these events Palmerston had resigned on the 
ground that the attitude of the Government towards Russia 
was not sufficiently stiff and peremptory ; for, from the first, 
Lord Aberdeen had never contemplated the possibility of war 
with Russia. But before the month was out Palmerston 
had resumed office. It will be seen from the following 
letter, written by Lord John's private secretary, Mr. Boileau, 
that disapproval of the Government's negotiations with Russia 
was not the only motive attributed by Whigs to Palmerston 
in resigning. Lord John had joined the Ministry on the 
condition that he should bring forward his measure of 
reform ; from the first most of his colleagues were very 
lukewarm towards it, but Palmerston was definitely, though 
covertly, antagonistic. 

Mr. John Boileau to Lady Melgund 

Foreign Office, December 19, 1853 
You will be glad to know something about Pam's resignation 
and the on dits here — if, as I hope, you are safely arrived at 
Minto. ... His own paper, the Morning Post, will do him more 
harm than good, I think. It will not allow that Reform has any- 
thing to do with his resignation — swears he is an out-and-out 
Reformer — and that his differing from the policy of the Cabinet 
on the Eastern Question is the only reason. Now this, in my 
humble judgment, I believe not to be the case. I feel certain, in 



1852-55] REFORM BILL 133 

fact I feel sure, that he goes out solely on the question of Reform, 
having been opposed to it in toto from the first moment of 
the discussion on it in the Cabinet, and though he went on 
with them for a time, they came to something that he could 
not swallow. As to the question of the East, if he does differ 
from the Cabinet it is no more than Lord John or several others 
might say if they went out to-morrow. . . . The Times of 
to-day has a very severe article against him. The Daily News is 
very sensible and implies great confidence in Lord John. The 
Chronicle is calm in its disapprobation of Pam — the Morning 
Advertiser, of all papers ! is the most in favour, and is crying 
Pam up for Prime Minister already, and gives extracts from 
county papers to show how popular he is. The Morning Herald- 
is silent on the subject. I send you these flying remarks, as I 
dare say you will see nothing at Minto except perhaps the Times, 
and any news in the country goes a great way. . . . London is 
very cold and painfully dull without 24 Chester Square, and you 
must write to me very often. You see / have begun very 
well. . . . 

Lord John, however, insisted on bringing forward his Bill 
in spite of opposition from his colleagues and many of the 
Government's supporters. He felt that the party was bound 
to keep its promise to the country, while his colleagues urged 
that the House of Commons was so much occupied by the 
war that they had no time to consider such a Bill. As the 
House of Commons was not conducting the war itself the 
excuse was shallow. Lord John threatened to resign unless 
he was allowed to introduce his measure, for he considered 
the honour of the Ministry and his own honour at stake. 
From the following letters it will be seen how hard he fought 
for this measure, and with what poignant regret he found him- 
self compelled at last to choose between letting it drop and 
resignation. His resignation would have meant a serious 
shock to a Ministry already in disgrace through their mis- 
management of the war ; rather than embarrass them further at 
such a crisis he chose the lesser evil of abandoning his Bill. 
But by yielding to the urgent appeals of his colleagues and 
continuing in office, his position became from day to day 
increasingly difficult. Finally, he resigned abruptly, for 
reasons which have been interpreted unfavourably by almost 
every historian who has written upon this period. 



134 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromhy 

London, February 14, 1854 

I remember almost crying in Minto days, when you were 
twelve, because I thought it past the prime of life. What shall I 
do now that you are striking forty-three ? I believe you have long 
ago made up your mind to the changing and fading and ending of 
all things here below, joys as well as sorrows, childhood, youth 
and age, hope and fear and doubt, and that you have learnt to 
look forward rather than back ; but to me this is often a struggle 
still ; and when the struggle ends the wrong way, how much there 
is to make my heart sink within me ! Chiefly, as you may guess, 
the deepening lines on the face of the dearest husband that ever 
blessed a home, and the comparison of him as he now is with him 
as he was when we married. 

Yesterday was a great day to us ; the Reform Bill was brought 
in. I suppose I should be better pleased if there was more 
enthusiasm. I should certainly have a better opinion of human 
nature, if those who have cried out most loudly for Reform did 
not set their cowardly faces against it now ; but at the same time 
there is a happy pride in seeing John's honest and patriotic per- 
severance in what he is convinced is right, through evil report and 
good report, in season and out of season. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Elizabeth Romilly 

February 28, 1854 

Dearest Lizzy, — To get out of my difficulty as to which of 
my other three correspondents to write to, I give my half-hour to 
you this morning. I must begin by thanking you all with all my 
heart for your most welcome congratulations on all that John has 
said and done since Parliament met, and especially his great 
speech in answer to Layard. It is indeed a happiness to hear 
such praise from people whose praise is worth having ; but I have 
now learned, if I had not long ago, how worthless many of the 
congratulations are, which I receive after a good speech which 
has set the Ministers firmer in their seats. It may be right the 
week after to make one which has a contrary effect, and then the 
congratulators become revilers. I knew when I began to write 
that I should be disagreeable, but had hoped not to be so as early 
as the second page. However, having got into the complaining 
mood, I will not hurry out of it ; and I shall be surprised if you 
do not admit that I have some reason for my complaints. 

For the last ten days John has been urged and pressed and 
threatened and coaxed and assailed by all the various arts of 
every variety of politician to induce him to give up Reform ! 
Mind, / say give up, where they say put off, because I know they 



1852-55] APATHY AND OFFICIALISM 135 

mean give up ; though cowards as they are in this as in every- 
thing else, they dare not say what they mean. Will you believe 
that the language poured into my pained and wounded and 
offended but very helpless ears, day after day, by official friends, 
is to the effect that the country is apathetic on Reform, and that 
therefore it should not be proceeded with ; that Reform is a 
measure calculated to produce excitement, conflict, disturbance in 
the country, and therefore it should not be proceeded with ; that 
John having given a pledge was bound, '' oh yes, certainly," to 
redeem it, and that all the world will agree he has most nobly 
redeemed it, if he lets his Bill fall on the floor of the House of 
Commons to-morrow, never to be picked up again ; that if he 
proceeds with it, he will be universally reproached for allowing 
personal hostility to Lord Palmerston to influence him to the 
injury of the country ; that his character is so high that if he gave 
it up, it would be utterly impossible for any creature to raise a 
doubt of his sincerity in bringing it forward ; that dissolution or 
resignation are revolution and ruin and disgrace ; that the caballers 
are iwrong, quite wrong, but that we must look at the general 
question and the possible results (a hackneyed expression which 
may sound wise but of which I too well know the drift) ; that it 
may often be very honourable to abandon friends and supporters 
with whom we agree, to conciliate the shabbies with whom we 
differ ; that, of course, they would be too happy to be out of 
office, but people must not consult their own wishes ; that I must 
be aware that Lord John is supposed sometimes to be a little 
obstinate, etc. In short, it all comes to this, that many M.P.'s are 
afraid of losing their seats by a dissolution, and many others 
whose boroughs are disfranchised hate the Reform Bill, and many 
more are anti- Reformers by nature, and all these combine to stifle 
it. . . . And to tell Lord John that really he has such a quantity 
of spare character that it can bear a little damaging ! I am 
ashamed and sick of such things, and should think my country no 
longer worth caring for, but for those brave men who have gone 
off to fight for her with a spirit worthy of themselves, and but for 
those lower classes in which Frederick ^ tells me to put my faith. 
... I must stop, not without fear that you may think me blind to 
the very real evil and danger of dissolution or resignation at the 
beginning of a great war. Indeed I am not — but those who see 
nothing hut these dangers are taking the very way to lead us into 
them. . . . Lord Aberdeen is firm as a rock ; it is due to him to 
say so. How shall I prevent my boys growing up to be cowards 
and selfish like the rest ? You see what a humour I am in. ... I 
never let out to anybody. When my friends give all this noble 
advice I sit to all appearance like Patience on a monument, but 

^ Colonel Romilly, husband of Lady Elizabeth Romilly, and son of Sir 
Samuel Romilly. 



136 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

not feeling like her at all — keeping silence because there is not 
time to begin at the first rudiments of morality, and there would 
be no use in anything higher up. Good-bye, poor Lizzy, doomed 
to suffer under my bad moods. God bless you all. 

Yours ever, 

F. R. 
Lord Granville to Lady John Russell 

February 28, 1854 

I have just heard that Lord John has consented to put off 
Reform till after Easter. It must have been a great personal 
sacrifice to him, but I am delighted for his own sake and the 
public cause that he has done it. There is no doubt but that 
nearly all who cry for delay are at bottom enemies to Reform. 
Reform is not incompatible with war, and it is not clear that a 
dissolution would be dangerous during its continuance, but an 
enormous majority of the House of Commons have persuaded 
themselves of the contrary. 

In all probability the apathetic approved of the Reform Bill 
only because it was out of the question for the present. New- 
castle agrees with me in thinking that a wall has been built which, 
at present, could not have been knocked down by the few who 
really desue Reform. 

Pembroke Lodge, April 8, 1854 

Painfully anxious day. Cabinet to decide on Reform or no 
Reform this session. 

Came here early with the children, wishing to be cheerful for 
John's sake, and knowing how much power Pembroke Lodge and 
the children have to make me so. Found this place most lovely ; 
the day warm and bright as June ; the children like larks escaped 
from a cage. At half-past seven John came looking worn and 
sad — no Reform, and no resignation ! Not a man in the Cabinet 
agreed with him that it would be best to go on with Reform, 
though several would have consented had he insisted, but he 
did not. Not one would hear either of his resignation or of 
Lord Palmerston's. In short — the present Ministry at any price. 
John dissatisfied with his colleagues, and worse with ihimself. 
May God watch over him and guide him. 

London, April 11, 1854 

The great day is over, and thank God John has stood the trial, 
and even risen, I believe, in the estimation of his followers and of 
men in general. The regrets, disapprobation, despair, reproaches 
that assailed him from the various sections of his party, on the 
rumours of his resignation, were of a kind that would have made 



1S52-55] WITHDRAWAL OF REFORM 137 

it wrong in him to persist ; for they proved that the heartiest 
reformers were against it, and would uphold him in remaining 
in the Government. 

There was deep silence when he rose. It was soon plain that 
the disposition of his supporters was good ; and throughout his 
noble, simple, generous, touching speech he was loudly cheered 
by them, and often by all sides. 

At the close there were a few words about his own position : 
he said that the course he was taking was open to suspicion from 

those who supported him — that if he had done anything Here 

his voice failed him, and there burst forth the most deafening 
cheers from all parts of the House, which lasted for a minute 
or two, till he was able to go on. If he had done anything 
for the cause of Reform he still hoped for their confidence. If 
not, his influence would be weakened and destroyed, and he 
could no longer lead them. This was the substance — not the 
words. It was a great night for him. He risked more than 
perhaps ought to be risked, but he has lost nothing, I trust 
and believe, and I hope he has gained more than the enthusiasm 
of a day. May God ever guide and bless him. 

Mr. George Mqffatt, M.P., to Lady John Russell 

103 Eaton Square, April 12, 1854 

Dear Lady John Russell, — Pardon my saying one word 
upon the touching event of last evening. A parliamentary expe- 
rience of nine years has never shown me so striking an instance 
of respectful homage and cordial sympathy as was then elicited. 
I know that the unbidden tears gushed to my cheeks, and looking 
round I could see scores of other careless, worldly men struck by 
the same emotion — and even the Speaker (as he subsequently 
admitted to me) was affected in precisely the same manner. 
The German-toy face of the Caucasian was of course as immovable 
as usual, but Mr. Walpole wept outright. I sincerely trust that 
the kindly enthusiasm of this moment may have in some measure 
compensated for the vexations and annoyances of the last two 
months. 

Believe me, your faithful servant, 

Geo. Moffatt 

Mr. John Boileau to Lady Melgimd 

London, April 12, 1854 

I wish I could write you a long letter giving an account of last 
night in the House of Commons. ... I would not have missed 
last night for the world. It was a melancholy instance of what a 
public servant in these days may have to go through, at the same 



138 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

time such a noble example of patriotism and self-sacrifice as I 
believe there is not another man in England capable of giving — 
and though I cannot yet resign my feeling that it w^ould have been 
better in the end both for Lord John and the Liberal party had he 
resigned, at present I have nothing to do but to admire, love, and 
respect more than ever the man who could, for the sake of his 
country and what he believes in his judgment to be the best 
for her, go through as painful a struggle as he has. . . . The scene 
in the House itself I shall never forget — the sudden pause when 
he began to speak of himself and his position — the sobs, and 
finally the burst of tears, and the almost ineffectual attempt to 
finish the remaining sentences, and at last obliged to give it up 
and sit down exhausted with the protracted struggle and the 
strain of nerve. He was loudly cheered from both sides of the 
House. 

Lord John Russell to Mr. John Abel Smiths 

April 12, 1854 

Dear Smith, — As I find some rumours have been mentioned to 
Lady John, false in themselves and injurious to me, I beg to assure 
you that it has been the greatest comfort to me to find that I 
received from her the best encouragement and support in the 
course which I ultimately adopted. She could not fail to perceive 
and to sympathize in the deep distress which the prospect of 
abandoning the Reform Bill caused me, and it was my chief 
consolation during a trying period to find at home regard for 
my fame and reputation as a sincere and earnest reformer. That 
regard has now been shown by the House of Commons generally, 
but there is no man in that House on whose friendship I more 
confidently rely, and with good reason, than yourself. 

Yours ever truly, 

J. Russell 

Lord Spencer to Lady John Russell 

Leamington, April 14, 1854 

Dear Lady John, — I cannot resist giving you the trouble to 
read a few lines from me on Lord John's speech the other night. 
Remembering the conversation we had on the subject of the pro- 
posed Reform Bill, when I ventured, perhaps too boldly and too 
roundly, to let out my unworthy opinion in a contrary sense, I 
think I ought to tell you that I had arrived some time ago at the 
same conclusion which Lord John announced to the House of 
Commons the other night, and I really believe if I had not, his 
reasons would have made me. I never read a more convincing 

^ Lord John's election agent. 



1852-55] LETTER TO LORD MINTO 139 

speech, and I never read so affecting a one. No man living, I 
believe, could have made that speech but your husband, and it 
gives me great pleasure to offer you my heartfelt congratulations 
upon it. . . . Pray forgive me, dear Lady John, for intruding thus 
on your time, and believe me. 

Very faithfully yours, 

Spencer 

Lady ^ohn Russell to Lord Minto. 

Pembroke Lodge, April 24, 1854 
My dearest Papa, — . . . I must dash at once into my subject, 
having only a quarter of an hour to spend on it. It is that of 
John's position ; he has, I believe, raised his character in the 
country by the witbdravi^al of the Reform Bill. His motives are 
above suspicion and unsuspected ; whereas, owing to the singular 
state of the public mind, it seems pretty sure that they ivoiild have 
been, though most unjustly, suspected, had he persisted in his 
resignation. But in the Cabinet I do not think his position 
improved, rather the reverse. The policy of the timid and the 
shabby and the ambitious and the cunning and the illiberal 
triumphed ; and all experience teaches me that John, having made 
a great sacrifice, will be expected to make every other that 
apparent expediency may induce his colleagues to require. He will 
always be pressed and urged and taunted with obstinacy, etc., 
and told that he will ruin his reputation, if for the sake of one 
question on which he may happen to differ with them, he exposed 
his country to the awful danger of a change of Ministry. ... It is 
for the avowed purpose of carrying on the war with vigour that 
Reform and other things are thrown aside. The Ministry has not 
asked the House of Commons or the country to declare, but has 
declared itself indispensable to the country, and the only possible 
Ministry competent to carry on the war. But if it has already 
proved, and if it daily goes on to prove, itself incompetent in time 
of peace to carry on measures of domestic improvement, and more 
specially incompetent either to prepare for or prosecute a great 
war, has John done right, has he done what the welfare of the 
country requires, in lending himself so long as its indispensable 
prop ? It is not incompetent from want of ability, but of unity. 
. . . He is considered by them to have wedded himself to them 
for better for worse more closely than ever by the withdrawal of 
Reform. . . . The wretched fears and delays and doubts which 
have, I firmly believe, first produced this war, and then made its 
beginning of so little promise, have had no effect as warnings for 
the future. . . . There will probably soon be great pressure put 
upon him to take office. . . . Nothing but the fact of his having 
no office, of his only part in the Government being work, 
has made him struggle along a very dangerous way unattacked 



I40 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

and unhurt. . . . With his opinion of Lord Aberdeen's Ministry 
he would be doing wrong, though from no worse motives than 
excess of deference to those with whom he acts, were he, after 
giving up Reform, to give up the degree of independence 
which he now has. . . . You can now partly conceive how 
doubtful I feel (and he does too) whether the withdrawal of 
Reform will ultimately be an advantage, though it is obvious 
that a break-up on that was more to be deprecated than on 
almost any other subject. John said this morning of his own 
accord that he feared he had been wrong in ever joining this 
Ministry, I wake every morning with the fear of some terrible 
national disaster before night, of disasters which could be borne if 
they were unavoidable, but will be unbearable if they could have 
been avoided. Do not, pray, think me a croaker without good reason 
for croaking. The greatness of the occasion is not understood. 
Ever, my dearest Papa, 

Your affectionate child, 

F. R. 

Matters were coming to a crisis in the Cabinet. The 
autumn and early winter of 1854 brought the victories of 
Alma, Balaclava, and Inkerman. As the country grew prouder 
of its soldiers its indignation at the way the civil side of the 
war had been organized increased. The incompetence of 
the War Office made the Government extremely unpopular, 
and a motion was brought forward in the House of Commons 
charging them with the mismanagement of the war. Directly 
after Mr. Roebuck had given notice of a motion for a Com- 
mittee of Inquiry, Lord John wrote to Lord Aberdeen that 
since he could not conscientiously oppose the motion, he 
must resign his office. The view which most historians have 
taken of this step is that it was an act of cowardly desertion 
on his part. As a member of the Government, he was as 
responsible as his colleagues for what had been done, and 
by resigning he was admitting that they deserved disgrace. 
Quotations from two important historical books will show the 
view which has been generally taken of his action. 

Lord Morley, in his " Life of Gladstone," says : 

. . . When Parliament assembled on January 23, 1855, Mr. 
Roebuck on the first night of the session gave notice of a motion 
for a Committee of Inquiry. Lord John Russell attended to the 
formal business, and when the House was up went home, accom- 



1852-55] LORD JOHN'S RESIGNATION 141 

panied by Sir Charles Wood. Nothing of consequence passed 
between the two colleagues, and no word was said to Wood in the 
direction of withdrawal. The same evening, as the Prime Minister 
was sitting in his drawing-room, a red box was brought in to him 
by his son, containing Lord John Russell's resignation. He was 
as much amazed as Lord Newcastle, smoking his evening pipe of 
tobacco in his coach, was amazed by the news that the battle of 
Marston Moor had begun. Nothing has come to light since to set 
aside the severe judgment pronounced upon this proceeding by 
the universal opinion of contemporaries, including Lord John's 
own closest political allies. That a Minister should run away 
from a hostile motion upon affairs for which responsibility was 
collective, and this without a word of consultation with a single 
colleague, is a transaction happily without precedent in the history 
of modern English Cabinets.^ 

Mr. Herbert Paul, in his brilliant "History of Modern 
England," gives a version of this occurrence, which, on the 
whole, is hardly less harsh towards Lord John. 

Well might Lord Palmerston complain of such behaviour as 
embarrassing. It was crippling. It furnished the Opposition 
with unanswerable arguments. " Here," they could say, " is the 
second man in your Cabinet, in his own estimation the first, 
knowing all that you know, and he says * that an inquiry by the 
House is essential. How then can you deny or dispute it ? '" In 
a foot-note he adds, " Lord John offered to withdraw his 
resignation if the Duke of Newcastle would retire [from the War 
Office] in favour of Palmerston. It had been settled before 
Christmas between Lord Aberdeen and the Duke that this change 
should be made. But no one else was aware of the arrangement, 
and Lord Aberdeen, though he had assented to it, declined to 
carry it out as the result of a bargain with Lord John." 

Now both these versions leave out an important fact in the 
private history of the Aberdeen Cabinet. Lord John had on 
two occasions at least, subsequent to giving way upon the 
question of the Reform Bill, tried to resign. Only the 
entreaties of the Queen and his colleagues had induced him 
to remain in the Ministry ; and then, it was understood, only 
until some striking success of arms should make his resignation 
of less consequence to them. But Sevastopol did not fall, and 

' Morley's "Life of Gladstone," vol. i, p. 521. See also Lord Stan- 
more's " Earl of Aberdeen," chap. x. 



142 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

Lord John hung on, urging in the meantime, emphatically and 
repeatedly, that the efficiency of the war administration must 
be increased, that the control must be transferred from the 
hands of the two Secretaries of War to the most vigorous 
Minister, Palmerston. At the Cabinet meeting of December 
6th, Lord John desisted from pressing this particular change, 
owing to Palmerston having written to him that he thought 
there were " no broad and distinct grounds " for removing the 
Duke of Newcastle, and confined himself, after criticizing the 
general conduct of the war, to announcing his intention of 
resigning in any case after Christmas. When it was objected 
that such an announcement was inconsistent with his remain- 
ing leader of the House of Commons till then, he offered to 
resign at once. He would have gladly done so had they not 
implored him to remain. On December 30th he drew up a 
memorandum of his criticisms upon the conduct of the war ; 
and on January 3rd he wrote to Lord Aberdeen : " Nothing 
can be less satisfactory than the result of the recent Cabinets. 
Unless you will direct measures for yourself, I see no hope for 
the efficient prosecution of the war. . . ." ^ 

When, therefore, on January 23rd, the Opposition demanded 
an inquiry, he was in a very awkward position. He had either 
to bar the way to changes he had been urging himself all 
along, or he was obliged to admit openly that he agreed with 
the critics of the Government. Had he chosen the first 
alternative he would have been untrue to his conviction that 
a change of method in conducting the war was absolutely 
essential to his country's success ; yet in choosing the second 
he was turning his back on his colleagues. No doubt the 
custom of the Constitution asks either complete acceptance of 
common responsibility from individual Ministers or their 
immediate resignation. Lord John had protested and pro- 
tested, but he had not resigned ; he was therefore responsible 
for what had been done while he was in the Cabinet. He had 
not resigned because he thought it bad for the country that 
the Government should be weakened while the war was at its 

' For a full account of these incidents the reader must be referred to 
Sir Spencer Walpole's " Life of Lord John Russell/' chap. xxv. 



1852-55] REASONS FOR RESIGNATION 143 

height, and he had hoped that by staying in the Cabinet he 
would be able to induce the Ministry to alter its methods of 
conducting the war. When he discovered that, in spite of 
reiterated protests, he could not effect these all-important 
changes from within, and when the House of Commons began 
to clamour for them from without, he decided that no con- 
siderations of loyalty to colleagues ought to make him stand 
between the country and changes so urgently desirable. It 
may be said that since he had acted all along on the ground 
that in keeping the strength of the Government intact lay the 
best chance of helping to bring the war to a successful and 
speedy conclusion, he was inconsistent, to say the least, in 
deserting his colleagues at a juncture which made their defeat 
inevitable. But the inconsistency is only superficial ; when 
he once had lost hope that the Government could be got 
to alter their methods of conducting the war, their defeat 
and dissolution, which he had previously striven to prevent, 
became the lesser of two evils. It was not an evil at all, as 
it turned out, for the dissolution brought the right man — 
Palmerston — into power. Lord John's mistake was in thinking 
that his long-suffering support of a loose-jointed, ill-working 
Ministry, like the Aberdeen Ministry, could have ever trans- 
formed it into a strong one. 

Lord Wriothesley Russell,^ whom Lady John wrote of years 
before as " the mildest and best of men," sent her a letter on 
February 8, 1855, containing the following passages : 

It is impossible to hear all these abominable attacks in silence. 
It makes me sad as well as indignant to hear the world speaking 
as if straight-forward honesty were a thing incredible — impossible. 
A man, and above all a man to whom truth is no new thing, says 
simply that he cannot assent to what he believes to be false, and 
the whole world says, What can he mean by it — treachery, trickery, 
cowardice, ambition, what is it ? My hope is that our statesmen 
may learn from John's dignified conduct a lesson which does not 
appear hitherto to have occurred to them — that even the fate of a 
Ministry will not justify a Ue. We all admire in fiction the stern 
uprightness of Jeanie Deans : " One word would have saved me, 
and she would not speak it." . . . Whether that word would have 

^ Lord John's stepbrother. 



144 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

saved them is a question — it was their only chance — and he would 
not speak it ; that word revolted his conscience, it would have 
been false. I know nothing grander than the sublime simplicity 
of that refusal. 

Nearly two years later, Lord John Russell, in a letter to his 
brother, the Duke of Bedford, said : 

. . . The question with me was how to resist Roebuck's motion. 
I do not think I was wrong in substance, but in form I was. I 
ought to have gone to the Cabinet and have explained that I could 
not vote against inquiry, and only have resigned if I had not 
carried the Cabinet with me. I could not have taken Palmerston's 
line of making a feeble defence. 

How absurd it is to suppose that cowardice could have 
dictated Lord John's decision at this time, his behaviour in 
circumstances to be recounted in the next chapter shows. 
Unpopular as his resignation made him with politicians, it 
was nothing to the storm of abuse which he was forced to 
endure when he chose, a few months later, to stand— now an 
imputed trimmer — for the sake of preserving what was best in 
a policy he had not originally approved. 

The troubles and differences of the Coalition Ministry did 
not lessen Lord John's regard for Lord Aberdeen, of whom he 
wrote in his last years : " I believe no man has entered public 
life in my time more pure in his personal views, and more free 
from grasping ambition or selfish consideration." 

Mr. RoUo Russell, on the publication of Mr. John Morley's 
" Life of Gladstone," wrote the following letter to the Times 
in vindication of his father's action with regard to Mr. 
Roebuck's motion : 

DuNROZEL, Haslemere, Surrey, November, 1903 

Sir, — In his admirable biography of Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Morley 
has given, no doubt without any intention of injury, an impression 
which is not historically correct by his account of my father's 
resignation in January, 1855, on the notice of Mr. Roebuck's motion 
for a Committee of Inquiry. I do not wish to apply to his 
account the same measure which he applies by quoting an 
ephemeral observation of Mr. Greville to my father's speech, 
but I do maintain that " the general effect is very untrue." 



1852-55] MR. ROLLO RUSSELL'S LETTER 145 

Before being judged a man is entitled to the consideration both 
of his character and of the evidence on his side. In the chapter 
to which I allude there is no reference to the records by which 
my father's action has been largely justified. There is no mention, 
I think, of these facts : that my father had again and again 
during the Crimean War urged upon the Cabinet a redistribution 
of offices, the more efficient prosecution of the war, the provision 
of proper food and clothing for the Army, which was then under- 
going terrible privations and sufferings, a better concert between 
the different Departments, and between the English and French 
camps, and, especially, the appointment of a Minister of War 
of vigour and authority. " As the welfare of the Empire and 
the success of the present conflict are concerned," he wrote at 
the end of November to the head of the Government, ''the conduct 
of the war ought to be placed in the hands of the fittest man who 
can be found for the post." He laid the greatest stress on more 
efficient administration. 

The miseries of the campaign increased. On January 30, 1855, 
Lord Malmesbury wrote : " The accounts from the Crimea are 
dreadful. Only 18,000 effective men ; 14,000 are dead and 11,000 
sick. The same neglect which has hitherto prevailed continues 
and is shown in everything." 

He held very strong views as to the duty of the House of 
Commons in regard to these calamities. " Inquiry is the proper 
duty and function of the House of Commons. . . . Inquiry is at 
the root of the powers of the House of Commons." 

He had been induced by great pressure from the highest 
quarters to join the Cabinet, and on patriotic grounds remained 
in office against his desire. He continually but unsuccessfully 
advocated Reform. Several times he asked to be allowed to 
resign. 

When, therefore, Mr. Roebuck brought forward a motion 
embodying the opinion which he had frequently urged on his 
colleagues, he could not pretend the opposite views and resist the 
motion for inquiry. 

The resignation was not so sudden as represented. On the 
6th of December, 1854, when the Cabinet met, he declared that 
he was determined to retire after Christmas ; after some con- 
ference with his colleagues, he wrote on December i6th to Lord 
Lansdowne : " I do not feel justified in taking upon myself to 
retire from the Government on that account [the War Office] at 
this moment." It is not the case that a severe judgment was 
pronounced upon these proceedings by the " universal " opinion 
of his contemporaries. His brother, Lord Wriothesley Russell, 
wrote : "It makes one sad to hear the world speaking as if 
straightforward honesty were a thing incredible, impossible." 
And the Duke of Bedford : " My mind has been deeply pained 



146 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1852-55 

by seeing your pure patriotic motives maligned and misconstrued 
after such a life devoted to the political service of the public." 
But the whole world was not against him. Among many letters 
of approval, I find one strongly supporting his action with regard 
to the Army in the Crimea and his course in quitting the Ministry, 
and quoting a favourable article in The Examiner ; another strongly 
approving, and stating : " I have this morning conversed with 
more than fifty gentlemen in the City, and they all agree with me 
that in following the dictates of your conscience you acted the 
part most worthy of your exalted name and character. . . . We 
recognize the importance of the principle which you yourself 
proclaimed, that there can be no sound politics without sound 
morality." Mr. John Dillon wrote : '' To have opposed Mr. 
Roebuck's motion and then to have defended what you thought 
and knew to have been indefensible would have been not a fault 
but a crime." 

Another wrote expressing the satisfaction and gratitude of the 
great majority of the inhabitants of his district in regard to his 
" efforts to cure the sad evils encompassing our brave country- 
men ; " and another wrote : " The last act of your official life was 
one of the most honourable of the sacrifices to duty which have 
so eminently distinguished you both as a man and a Minister." 

There was no doubt a common outcry against the act of 
resignation at the time, but the outcry against certain Ministers 
of the Peelite group was still louder, and their conduct, as Mr. 
Morley relates, was pronounced to be " actually worse than Lord 
John's." " Bad as Lord John's conduct was," wrote Lord 
Malmesbury on February 22^ 1855, " this [of Graham, Gladstone, 
and Herbert] is a thousand times worse." 

The real question, however, is not what the public thought at 
the time, but what a fuller knowledge of the facts will determine, 
and I contend that my father's dissatisfaction with the manner 
in which the war was conducted, and his failure to induce the 
Cabinet to supply an effective remedy, justified if it did not 
compel his resignation. 

Mr. Roebuck's motion accelerated a resignation which the 
Prime Minister knew had been imminent during the preceding 
ten weeks. 

My father himself admitted that he made great mistakes, that 
for the manner of his resignation he was justly blamed, and that 
he ought never to have joined the Coalition Ministry. He had 
a deep sense, I may here say, of Mr. Gladstone's great generosity 
towards him on all occasions. At this distance of time the com- 
plication of affairs and of opinions then partly hidden can be 
better estimated, and the conduct of seceders from the Govern- 
ment cannot in fairness be visited with the reprobation which was 
natural to co;itemporaries. The floating reproaches of the period 



1852-55] MR. ROLLO RUSSELL'S LETTER 147 

in regard to my father's action seem to imply, if justified, that he 
ought to have pubhcly defended the conduct of mihtary affairs 
which he had persistently and heartily condemned. It appears to 
me that not only his candid nature, but the story of his life, refutes 
these reproaches, as clearly as similar reproaches are refuted by 
the life of Gladstone. 

Yours faithfully, 

RoLLO Russell 



CHAPTER VIII 

1855 

THE debate upon Roebuck's motion of inquiry lasted 
two nights, and at its close the Aberdeen Ministry 
fell, beaten by a majority of 157. Historians have seen in 
this incident much more than the fall of a Ministry,, 

Behind the question whether the civil side of the Crimean 
campaign had been mismanaged lay the wider issue whether 
the Executive should allow its duties to be delegated to a 
committee of the House of Commons. " The question which 
had to be answered," says Mr. Bright in his " History of 
England," " was whether a great war could be carried to a 
successful conclusion under the blaze of publicity, when every 
action was exposed not only to the criticism and discussion of 
the Press, but also to the more formidable and dangerous 
demands of party warfare within the walls of Parliament." 

After both Lord John and Lord Derby had failed to form 
a Government, the Queen sent for Lord Palmerston. 

Lady John, when her husband was summoned to form 
a Government, wrote to him from Pembroke Lodge on 
February 3, 1855 : 

All the world must feel that the burden laid upon you, though 
a very glorious, is a very heavy one. . . . Politics have never yet 
been what they ought to be ; men who would do nothing mean 
themselves do not punish meanness in others when it can serve their 
party or their country, and excuse their connivance on that 
ground. That ground itself gives way when fairly tried. You 
are made for better days than these. I know how much better 
you really are than me. . . . You have it in your power to purify 

148 



i855] PALMERSTON PRIME MINISTER 149 

and to reform much that is morally wrong — much that you would 
not tolerate in your own household. ..." Whatsoever things 
are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are 
honest," on these things take your stand — hold them fast, let them 
be your pride — let your Ministry, as far as in you lies, be made 
of such men, that the more closely its deeds are looked into, the 
more it will be admired. . . . Pray for strength and wisdom from 
above, and God bless and prosper you, dearest. 



But Lord John failing to find sufficient support, Lord 
Palmerston became Prime Minister. His first Cabinet was a 
coalition. It included, besides some new Whig Ministers, all 
the members of the previous Cabinet with the exception of 
Lord John, Lord Aberdeen, and the Duke of Newcastle. But 
on Palmerston accepting the decision of the last Parliament in 
favour of a Committee of Inquiry, Gladstone, Sidney Herbert, 
and Sir James Graham resigned ; their reason being that the 
admission of such a precedent for subordinating the Executive 
to a committee of the House was a grave danger to the 
Constitution. 

It looked as though the Ministry would fall, when Lord 
John, who had previously refused office, to the surprise and 
delight of the Whigs, accepted the Colonies. His motives 
in taking office will be found in the following letters. He 
had already accepted a mission as British Plenipotentiary at 
the Conference of Vienna, summoned by Austria to conclude 
terms of peace between the Allies and Russia. He did not 
therefore return at once to take his place in the Cabinet, but 
continued on his mission. Its consequences were destined to 
bring down on him such a storm of abuse as the careers of 
statesmen seldom survive. When Gladstone and the Peelites 
resigned, Palmerston's Ministry ceased to be a coalition and 
became a Whig Cabinet. The fact that Lord John came to 
Palmerston's rescue, that he accepted without hesitation a 
subordinate office and served under Palmerston's leadership 
in the Commons, shows that Lord John's reluctance to serve 
in the first instance under Lord Aberdeen could not have 
been due to a scruple of pride ; nor could his obstinate 
insistence upon his own way inside the Cabinet, of which the 



I50 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

Peelites had complained in the early days of Lord Aberdeen's 
Ministry, have been caused by a desire to make the most of 
his own importance. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Paris, February 23, 1855 

I have accepted office in the present Ministry. Whatever 
objections you may feel to this decision, I have taken it on the 
ground that the country is in great difficulty, and that every per- 
sonal consideration ought to be waived. I am sure I give a 
Liberal Government the best chance of continuing by so acting. 
When I come home, I shall have weight enough in the Cabinet 
through my experience and position. In the meantime I go on 
to Vienna. ... I shall ascertain whether peace can be made on 
honourable terms, and having done this, shall return home. 

The office I have accepted is the Colonial ; but as I do not 
lead in the Commons, it will not be at all too much for my health. 

Mr, John Abel Smith to Lady John Russell 

February 24, 1855 

I received this morning, to my great surprise, a letter from 
Lord John announcing his acceptance of the Seals of the Colonial 
Department. ... I believe it to be unquestionably the fact that by 
this remarkable act of self-sacrifice he has saved Lord Palmerston's 
Government and preserved to the Liberal party the tenure of 
power. ... I never saw Brooks's more thoroughly excited than 
this evening, and some old hard-hearted stagers talking of Lord 
John's conduct with tears in their eyes. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Brussels, February 25, 1855 

The wish to support a Whig Government under difficulties, 
the desire to be reunited to my friends, with whom when 
separated by two benches I could have had no intimate alliance, the 
perilous state of the country with none but a pure Derby Govern- 
ment in prospect, have induced me to take this step. No doubt 
my own position was better and safer as an independent man ; 
but I have thrown all such considerations to the winds. ... I am 
very much afraid of Vienna for the children ; but if you can 
arrive and keep well, it will be to me a great delight to see you all. 
... I have just seen the King, who is very gracious and kind. 
He thinks I may make peace. 



i855] LORD JOHN ACCEPTS OFFICE 151 

Lady J^ohn to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, February 26, 1855 

Mr. West called yesterday, and was full of admiration of 
the magnanimity of your conduct, but not of its wisdom. J, A. 
Smith writes me a kind letter telling me of the delight of your 
late calumniators at Brooks's, Frederick Romilly says London 
society is charmed. He touched me very much. He spoke with 
tears in his eyes of the generosity of your motives, and of the 
irreparable blow to yourself and the country from your abandon- 
ment of an honourable and independent position for a renewal of 
official ties. . . . Papa is very grave and unhappy, doing justice of 
course to your motives, but fearing that in sacrificing yourself you 
sacrifice the best interests of the country. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Berlin, March i, 1855 

It was necessary in order to have any effect to decide at once 
on my acceptance or refusal of office. I considered the situation 
of affairs to be a very serious one. I had hoped that Lord 
Palmerston, with the assistance of the Peelites, might go through 
the session. Suddenly the secession took place, producing a 
state of affairs such as no man ever remembered. Confidence in 
the Government was shaken to a very great extent by the mortality 
and misery of our Army in the Crimea. I could not resist 
inquiry ; but having yielded that point, it seemed dastardly to 
leave men, who had nothing to do with sending the expedition to 
the Crimea, charged with the duty of getting the Army out of 
the difficulty. Yet it was clear that Lord Palmerston's Govern- 
ment without my help could hardly stand, and thus the Govern- 
ment of 1854 would have been convicted of deserting the task 
they had undertaken to perform. There remained the personal 
difficulty of my serving under Palmerston in the House of 
Commons ; for my going to the House of Lords would have been 
only a personal distinction to me and would not have helped 
Palmerston in his difficulty. In the circumstances of the case 
I thought it right to throw aside every consideration of ease, 
dignity, and comfort. If I had not been responsible for the 
original expedition to the Crimea, I would certainly not have 
taken the office I have now accepted. Still, it brings the scattered 
remnants of the Liberal party together and enables them to try 
once more whether they can govern with success. . . . Lord 
Minto is now satisfied that I have followed a public call ; for 
public men must sacrifice themselves in a great emergency. It 
was not a time to think of self. . . . We had an account of the 



152 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

serious illness of the Emperor of Russia. If he should die, I 
should have good hopes of peace. ... 

March 2nd. News come of the Emperor's death. I hope 
it may be a good event for Europe, but it makes me sad at 
present. " What shadov^s we are and what shadows we pursue " 
constantly occurs to my mind. . . . My mission may perhaps be 
more successful in consequence, but no one can say. At all events 
you will come to Vienna. . . . 

Poor little boys and poor little Agatha ! I should feel more 
responsible with those children on a journey than with my mission 
and the Colonies to boot. 



In Paris his conversations with the Emperor confirmed his 
previous opinion that the best hope of peace lay in winning 
Austria over to the policy of the Allies. 

Lady John joined him at Vienna early in March. In order 
to understand the following extracts it is necessary to recall 
the history of the whole negotiation. 

Lord John had been dispatched with vague general instruc- 
tions, and it must not be forgotten that Palmerston was 
privately much more in favour of continuing the war than 
Lord John appears to have understood at the time. Palmer- 
ston, like Napoleon III, wished to take Sevastopol before 
making peace ; Lord John did not therefore receive during 
his negotiations the backing he ought to have had from the 
Government at home. A hitch occurred at the outset of 
the negotiations owing to the delay of instructions from the 
Sultan. This delay was engineered by Lord Stratford de 
Redcliffe, who was determined that Russia should be still 
further humiliated, and felt sure of Palmerston's sympathy 
in doing everything that tended to prolong the war. Lord 
John might complain justly that he was being hindered ; but 
the English Ambassador at Constantinople, who knew Palmer- 
ston's mind, felt safe in ignoring Lord John's remonstrances. 
The first two Articles which formed the subject of discussion 
dealt with the abolition of the Russian Protectorate over 
Servia and the Principalities, and with the question of the 
free navigation of the Danube. These Articles were accepted 
by Russia. On the third Article, which concerned the Russian 
power in the Black Sea, the representatives of the Western 



i855] THE VIENNA CONFERENCE 153 

Powers could not agree. Gortschakoff, the Russian emissary, 
admitted that the Treaty of 1841 would have to be altered in 
such a way as would prevent the preponderance of the 
Russian power off the coast of Turkey. This could have been 
secured in two ways : 

1. By excluding Russian vessels from the Black Sea 

altogether ; 

2. By Hmiting the number of warships Russia might be 

permitted to keep there ; 
but to neither of these methods would Russia at first agree. 

Two other alternative proposals were then made by the 
Austrian Minister, Count Buol. The first was based on the 
principle of counterpoise, which would give the Allies the 
right to keep as many ships as Russia in the Black Sea. The 
second was a stipulation that Russia should not increase her 
fleet there beyond the strength at which it then stood. 

The representatives of the Allies were instructed from home 
not to accept the proposal of counterpoise. So the second 
alternative of the Austrian Chancellor was the last remaining 
chance of Austria and the Allies agreeing upon the terms to 
be offered to Russia. Lord John wrote to the Government 
urging them to accept this compromise ; for in his opinion 
the only chance of peace lay in the Allies acting in concert 
with Austria. At this juncture he received a telegram from 
home saying that the Government were in favour of a 
proposal, which had reached them from Paris, for neutralizing 
the Black Sea. 

Prince Gortschakoff at once pointed out that such a plan 
would leave Russia disarmed in the presence of Turkey armed. 
Lord John considered this a perfectly just objection on the 
part of Russia, while the proposal had the unfortunate effect 
of detaching Austria from the Allies, who considered neutra- 
lization to be out of the question. M. Drouyn de L'Huys, 
the French representative, held the same opinion as Lord 
John, and when his advice was not accepted by the Emperor, 
he sent in his resignation. Lord John likewise wrote to 
Lord Clarendon, then Foreign Secretary, tendering his 
own. 



154 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

March 31, 1855, Vienna 

Private letters from Lord Clarendon and Lord Lansdowne full 
of distrust and disapprobation of the proceedings here, though not 
openly finding fault with John. Lord Clarendon's more especially 
warlike, and anti-Austrian and pro-French ; the very reverse of 
every letter he wrote in the days of Lord Aberdeen. 

April I, 1855, Vienna 

More letters and dispatches making John's position still worse ; 
representing him as ready to consent to unworthy terms, whereas 
he was endeavouring to carry out what had been agreed on by the 
Government. No doubt Lord Clarendon's present tone is far 
better than his former ; but that is not the question. John 
naturally indignant and talked of giving up mission and Colonies. 
This I trust he will not do unless there is absolute loss of character 
in remaining, for another breach with Lord Palmerston, who is far 
less to blame than Lord Clarendon, would be a great misfortune — 
besides, it might lead to the far greater evil of a breach with 
France. I rejoice therefore that John has resolved to wait for 
Drouyn de L'Huys and do his utmost to bring matters to a better 
state. 

On April 5, at Vienna, when he wished to resign, she 
wrote : " Anxious he should delay this step till he hears again 
from home, as he might repent it, in which case either re- 
tracting or abiding by it would be bad. Having regretted 
his acceptance of office it seems inconsistent to discourage 
resignation, but is not really so. His reputation cannot 
afford a fresh storm, and he must show that he did not 
lightly consent to belong to a Ministry of which he knew the 
materials so well." 

At the end of April they came back to England. 

May 5, 1855, London 

After all the Emperor rejects the plan [the proposal to limit 
the Russian fleet in the Baltic to its strength at the close of the 
war] on the plea that the army would not bear it. John disturbed 
and perplexed. 

May 6, 1855, Sunday 

John went to town for a meeting at Lord Panmure's on Army 
Reform — found here on his return a letter from Lord Clarendon 
telling him that the Emperor had sent a telegram through Lord 



1855] PEACE NEGOTIATIONS 155 

Cowley and the Foreign Office to Walewski, offering him Foreign 
Affairs and asking whether the Queen would agree to Persigny as 
French Ambassador. Thus the dismissal or resignation of Drouyn 
obliged John to resolve on his own resignation unless the Cabinet 
should accept his own view. 

Lord John Russell to Lord Clarendon ^ 

Pembroke Lodge, May 6, 1855 
My dear Clarendon, — I was at Panmure's when your box 
arrived here, and did not get back till past eight. I am very much 
concerned at the removal or resignation of Drouyn. I cannot 
separate myself from him ; and, having taken at Vienna the same 
view which he did, his resignation entails mine. I am very sorry 
for this, and wished to avoid it. But I have in some measure got 
Drouyn into this scrape, for at first he was disposed to advise the 
Emperor to insist on a limitation of ships, and I induced him not 
to give any advice at all to the Emperor. Afterwards we agreed 
very much ; and, if he had stayed in office there, I might have 
gulped, though with difficulty, the rejection of my advice here. 
However, I shall wait till Colloredo has made a definite proposal, 
and then make the opinion I shall give upon it in the Cabinet a 
vital question with me. It is painful to me to leave a second 
Cabinet, and will injure my reputation — perhaps irretrievably. 
But I see no other course. Do as you please about communicating 
to Palmerston what I have written. I fear I must leave you and 
Hammond to judge of the papers to be given. . . . But I hope 
you will not tie your hands or those of the Government by giving 
arguments against what the nation may ultimately accept. I hold 
that a simple provision, by which the Sultan would reserve the 
power to admit the vessels of Powers not having establishments in 
the Black Sea, through the Straits at his own pleasure at all times, 
. . . and a general treaty of European alliance to defend Turkey 
against Russia, would be a good security for peace. If the 
Emperor of the French were to declare that he could not accept 
such a peace, of course we must stick by him, but that does not 
prevent our declaring to him our opinion. Walewski spoke to me 
very strongly at the Palace in favour of the Austrian plan, but I 
suppose he has now made up his mind against it. 

I remain, yours truly, 

J. Russell 
Lord Clarendon replied : 

G[rosvenor] C[rescent], May 7, 1855 
My dear Lord John, — . . . I am very sorry you did not come 
in just now, as I wanted most particularly to see you. I now write 

' Spencer Walpole's " Life of Lord John Russell," chap. xxvi. 



156 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

this earnestly to entreat that you will say nothing to anybody at 
present about your intended resignation. The public interests and 
your own position are so involved in the question, and so much 
harm of every kind may be done by a hasty decision, however 
honourable and high-minded the motives may be, that I do beg of 
you well to weigh all the points of the case ; and let me frankly 
add that you will not act with fairness, and as I am sure you must 
wish to act, towards your colleagues, if you do not hear what some 
of them may have to say. 

As you allowed me to do as I pleased about informing Palmer- 
ston, I did not think it right to leave him in the dark upon a 
matter which seems to me of vital importance. I need not tell 
you that your intention causes him the deepest regret, and he 
feels, as I do, how essential it is that nothing should be known of 
it at present. We are not even in possession of the facts that led 
to Drouyn's resignation. 

Yours sincerely, 

Clarendon 

"Moved by this appeal," says Sir Spencer Walpole, "and by 
Lord Palmerston's personal entreaties, thrice repeated. Lord 
John withdrew his resignation. Its withdrawal, however con- 
venient it may have seemed to the Government at the time, 
was one of the most unfortunate circumstances of Lord 
John's political career. It directly led to misunderstandings 
and to obloquy, such as few public men have ever en- 
countered." 

London, May 8, 1855 

John given up thoughts of resignation. Glad of it, since he can 
honourably remain. I know how his reputation would have suffered 
— not as an honest man, but as a wise statesman. 

This was the second time in Lord John's career that his 
loyalty to the Whig party involved him in a false position. 
On May 24th Disraeli proposed a vote of cehsure on the 
Government for their conduct of the war and condemning 
their part in the negotiations at Vienna. Lord John made, in 
reply to Gladstone and Disraeli, an extremely forcible speech, 
urging that the limitation of the number of Russian ships in 
the Black Sea did not give sufficient guarantee to the safety 
of Turkey. Shortly afterwards the Austrian Chancellor, Count 



i855] MOTION OF CENSURE 157 

Buol, published the fact that Lord John had been in favour 
of this very compromise, which Austria had proposed at the 
Congress. He was at once asked whether this was true, and 
he admitted that it was. He could not explain that he had 
taken a different line on his return because, had he stuck to 
his opinion, the French alliance would have been endangered. 
The Emperor was persuaded that the fall of Sevastopol was 
necessary to the safety of his throne. Marshal Vaillant had 
said to him, " I know the feelings of the Army. I am sure that 
if, after having spent months in the siege of Sevastopol, we 
return unsuccessful, the Army will not be satisfied." ^ Since 
this was the case. Lord John had had to choose between 
resigning on the strength of his own opinion that the Austrian 
terms were good enough, thus bringing about the fall of the 
Ministry and a possible breach with France, or relinquishing 
his own opinion and defending the view of the Government 
and the Emperor in order to preserve a good understanding 
with the French. Of course, to all the world it looked as 
though, for the sake of office, he had belied his own con- 
victions. Seldom has any Minister of the Crown been placed 
in a more painful position. The Cabinet knew the true cir- 
cumstances of the case, and the reason why he could give no 
explanation for his inconsistency : but many of his friends did 
not. A motion of censure was proposed against him, and now 
that his presence in the Ministry had ceased to be a support, 
and had actually become a source of weakness through the 
condemnation passed on him by the country at large, he 
offered to resign. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, June 8, 1855 
All is more beautiful than ever this morning. I am on my 
pretty red sofa looking out from my middle window in lazy luxury 
at oak, ivy, hawthorn, laburnum, and blue sky ; not very much to 
be pitied, am I ? except, my dearest, for the weary, weary separa- 
tion that takes away the life of life — and for my anxiety about 
what is to be the result of all this, which, however, I do not allow 
to weigh upon me. We are in wiser hands than our own, and I 

' Kinglake, " Invasion of the Crimea," vol. iii, p. 348. 



158 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

should be a bad woman indeed if so much leisure did not give 
some good thoughts that I trust nothing can disturb. . . . Pray 
tell dear Georgy not to think any but cheerful thoughts of me, and 
that she can do a great deal for me by asking my friends — Cabinet 
and ex-Cabinet and all sorts — to visit me whenever they are 
inclined for a drive into the country and luncheon or tea among 
its beauties. 

Pembroke Lodge, July 5, 1855 

John to town and back. He is so much here now that my life 
is quite different, and as I know he neglects no duty for the sake 
of coming, I may also allow myself to enjoy it as he does. 

Pembroke Lodge, July 7 

Read John's speech and the bitter comments of Cobden and 
Roebuck. Whether he was right or wrong in his views of peace, 
or in not resigning when they were rejected by the Cabinet, he has 
nobly told the simple truth without gloss or extenuation. 

Pembroke Lodge, July 10 

John writes that he saw Lord Palmerston and told him that he 
had thought the Austrian proposals ought to be accepted at the 
time ; but that he did not think they ought now, after the late events 
of the war. He proposed resignation if it would help the Govern- 
ment. Lord Palmerston of course begged him to remain, which 
he will do. The subject is more painful to me the more I think 
of it. 

Pembroke Lodge, July 12 

An anxious parting with John. He was to go straight to Lord 
Clarendon, to find out what portion of the dispatches Lord 
Clarendon was prepared to give. His explanation to be made 
to-night of a sentence in his Friday's speech, by which some of 
his colleagues understood him to declare his opinion to be that he 
thought the Austrian proposal ought now to be accepted. He did 
not say so, and such an explanation is much to be lamented. His 
position is very painful, and my thoughts about him more so than 
they have ever been, because now many of his best and truest 
friends grieve and are disappointed. God grant he may have 
life, strength, and spirit to work on for his country till he has risen 
again higher than ever in her trust, esteem, and love. 

Pembroke Lodge, July 13 

A very anxious morning, thinking of my dear and noble 
husband, doomed to suffer so much for no greater fault than 



i855] LORD JOHN RESIGNS 159 

having committed himself too far without consultation with his 
colleagues to a scheme which higher duties persuaded him not 
to abide by when he failed to convince them. Anxiety to know 
his determination and the state of his spirits made me send a note 
up to town early, to which I received his answer about four, that 
he had written his resignation last night and sent it to Lord 
Palmerston this morning. 



Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, July 13, 1855 

We are all well, but I am too anxious to be all day without 
hearing from you ; besides, and chiefly, I want to cheer you up 
and beseech you not to let all this depress you more than it 
ought. Don't believe the Daily News when it says you have 
committed political suicide — that need not be a bit more true 
than that there was trickiness or treachery in your course, which it 
also asserts. Depend upon it, it is in your power and it is there- 
fore your duty to show that you can still be yourself. You will 
rise again higher than ever if you will but think you can — if you 
will but avoid for the future the rocks on which you have some- 
times split. There is plenty to do for your country, plenty that 
you can do better than any other man, and you must not sink. You 
made, I believe, a great mistake in surrendering your own judgment 
to that of those who surrounded you at Vienna ; but who can dare 
to say you were favouring any interest of your own, or what malice 
or ingenuity can pretend to find the shadow of a low or unworthy 
motive ? Remember Moore's lines : 



" Never dream for a moment thy country can spare 
Such a light from her darkening horizon as thou." 



As to your immediate course, what have you resolved ? 
Surely your own resignation is the most natural — you might 
persuade your colleagues, if they require persuasion, to let you go 
alone, as you alone are responsible, that you think a change of 
Ministry would be a misfortune, and that you would be unhappy 
to find that added to your responsibility. . . . The feeling that 
the Ministry may be sacrificed to you is a very painful one, and I 
earnestly hope your wisdom may find some means of averting 
this. . . . Now, my dearest, farewell — would that I could go to 
you myself. I am told that the expectation of the Whips is that 
you will be beat. Tell me as much as you can and God speed 
you. . . . Good-bye, and above all keep up a good heart for your 
country's sake and mine. 



i6o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

Lord Palmerston replied to his offer to resign in the 
following terms : ^ 

Piccadilly, ^uly 13, 1855 
My dear Lord John, — I have received, I need not say with 
how much regret, your letter of this morning, and have sent it 
down to the Queen, But, whatever pain I may feel at the step 
you have taken, I must nevertheless own that as a public man, 
whose standing and position are matters of public interest and 
public property, you have judged rightly. The storm is too strong 
at this moment to be resisted, and an attempt to withstand it 
would, while unsuccessful, only increase irritation. But juster 
feelings will in due time prevail. In the meantime I must thank 
you for the very friendly and handsome terms in which you have 
announced to me your determination. 

Yours sincerely, 

Palmerston 

Pembroke Lodge, J^uly 15, 1855 

John and I agreed that we felt almost unaccountably happy — 
there is, however, much to account for it — much that cannot be 
taken from us. 

Lady John Russell to the Duke of Bedford 

Pembroke Lodge, July 16, 1855 

My dear Duke, — You will like to hear how John has borne 
his new trouble, and I am very glad to tell you that he is in good 
spirits, and as calm as a clear conscience can make him. The week 
before his resignation was a very anxious one, reminding me of 
that sad and anxious day at Woburn when he determined to dismiss 
Lord Palmerston, and of that other when he resolved not to speak 
to any of his colleagues before sending his resignation to Lord 
Aberdeen. Those occasions were so far like this that it was 
impossible even for me, though unable to judge of the questions 
politically, not to foresee painful consequences in the altered rela- 
tions of old friends, and therefore not to lament his decisions ; 
though he had, as he was sure to have, high and generous reasons 
in both cases. Here again, there has been much to lament in all 
that led to his resignation and fresh separation from many with 
whom he has acted during half his political life, many so highly 
valued in public and private. One cannot but feel all this, nor 
do I pretend indifference to what is said of him, for I do think the 
next best thing to deserving " spotless reputation " is possessing it. 
But there are many comforts — first and foremost, a faith in him 

' Spencer Walpole's " Life of Lord John Russell." 



1855] OUT OF OFFICE 161 

that nothing can shake ; then a firm hope that the country will 
one day understand him better — besides, the relief was immense 
of finding that he would be allowed to resign without breaking up 
the Government. In short, we agreed yesterday that after all our 
pains and anxieties we both felt strangely and almost unaccount- 
ably happy. Of course, seeing him so was enough to make me so, 
and perhaps there is something too in the unexpected freedom of 
body and soul which loss of office has given him. This state 
of mind, in which he has just left me for London, gives me 
good hope that he will get well through his hard task to- 
night. ... 

Ever yours affectionately, 

Fanny Russell 



Lady John Russell to Lord Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, July 18, 1855 

My dearest Papa, — I feel very guilty in not having written to 
you since all these great events occurred, but you are pretty well 
able to guess what I felt about them . . . and the newspapers are 
much better chroniclers of facts, though not of motives, than I can 
be. ... Of course, he proposed resignation immediately after he 
had made his speech, but it was not then thought the Ministry 
would be beat on Bulwer's motion, and Lord Palmerston and the 
rest begged him to remain. Very soon, however, there was no 
doubt left as to what would be the result of the motion, and as 
neither John nor Doddy, the only other person I saw, had a hope 
that any fresh resignation would be accepted, we had the painful 
prospect of the destruction of the Ministry by his means. . . . But 
the surprise was great as the relief when we found that not one 
man had the slightest difficulty in making up his mind, . . . and 
that one and all felt it a paramount duty *' not to shrink from 
the toils and responsibilities of office." . . . His spirits have not 
sunk and his spirit has risen, and the feeling uppermost in his 
mind is thankfulness that he is out of it all, and has regained 
his freedom, body and soul. . . . There is plenty left for him to 
do, and I trust he will do it as an independent member of 
Parliament, and in that position regain his lost influence with 
the country. I am most anxious he should not think his political 
life at an end, though his ofiicial life may go forever without a 
sigh. ... I ought to add that he is on perfectly friendly terms 
with all his late colleagues, . . . anxious to help them when he 
can, but pledged to nothing. . . . 

Ever, dearest Papa, 

Your affectionate child, 

F. R. 



i62 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855 

Pembroke Lodge, July 23, 1855 

Thunderstorm during which I sat in the Windsor summer- 
house writing and thinking many sad thoughts ; chiefly of my own 
ill-performance of many duties on which my whole heart and 
soul were bent. Had I but known when we married as much of 
the world as I know now, though I should have been far, far less 
happy, I should have done better in many ways. . . . Came in ; 
went to my room with Georgy and took Baby on my lap. Baby 
looked at me, saw I had been sad, and said gravely, '' Poor Mama," 
adding immediately, '' Where is Papa ? " as if she thought my 
sadness must have to do with him. On my answering, " He is gone 
to London," she put her dear little arms round my neck and kissed 
and coaxed me, repeating over and over, " Never mind, never 
mind, my dear Mama," and again, " Never mind, my poor Mama." 

The state of Lady John's health prevented her from leaving 
home, but Lord John left Pembroke Lodge with two of the 
children on August 9th, for a much needed holiday in 
Scotland. 

Lord John to Lady John Russell 

Edinburgh, August 10, 1855 

We got here safely yesterday an hour after time, which made 
about fourteen hours from Pembroke Lodge. . . . Dearest, it is a 
very melancholy journey ; without you to comfort me I take a very 
gloomy view of everything ; but I hope the Highland air will 
refresh me with its briskness. ... I have a letter from Lord Minto, 
disturbed at my not coming sooner, and supposing I shall be 
abused for my Italian speech, in which he is quite right ; but I 
may save some poor devil by my denunciation of his persecutors. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, August 12, 1855 

It grieves me to have to write what will grieve you, but it 
would be wrong and useless to hide it from you — I was taken 
ill suddenly yesterday. . . . What I bear least well is the 
thought of you. I did so hope that after all your political troubles 
you might be spared anxieties of a worse kind ; but it was not 
to be. ... I hope, dearest, you will not hurry home 
immediately. I should be so sorry to think you only had the 
fatigue of two long journeys, instead of some weeks of Highland 
air. I know how sadly your enjoyment will be damaged, but do 
not — I beg you, dearest — do not let your spirits sink. Nothing 
would make your poor old wife so sad. Georgy is the best and 




LADY JOHN RUSSELL AND HER DAUGHTER 

FROM A WATER-COLOUR DRAWING BY MARY SEVERN. 1854 



1855] ILLNESS 163 

dearest of children and nurses ; I am so sorry for her. Yesterday 
she was quite upset, far more than I was, but to-day she has taken 
heart. God bless you. Think what happy people we still are — 
happy far beyond the common lot — in one another and all our 
darlings. 

When Lord John heard of her illness, he wrote that he 
could not be a moment easy away from her, and came home at 
once. 

Pembroke Lodge, September 8, 1855 

Thank God ! though in bed, I have generally been able to 
read and talk, and for the last two days have given Johnny and the 
little boys their lessons. . . . Cannot but hope I am a little less 
impatient of illness, a little less unreasonably sorry to be debarred 
from air and liberty and all I care for most in this world, than I 
used to be. ... I pray with my whole heart for the true faith and 
patience that can never fail. I pray that, since I cannot teach my 
children how to do, I may teach them how to bear, so that even 
in illness I may not be wholly useless to them. 



CHAPTER IX 
1855-60 

DURING the next four years Lord John remained out 
of office. He devoted much time to Hterary work. 
Besides writing his "Life of Fox" and editing the papers 
of his friend Thomas Moore, he deHvered three important 
addresses. The first was a lecture on the causes which have 
checked moral and political progress. As will be seen from 
Lady John's diary, he was still so unpopular that she felt some 
dread of its reception at the hands of a large public audience. 

London, November 13, 1855 

Great day well over. ... At half-past seven set out for Exeter 
Hall. John well cheered on his entrance, but not so warmly as to 
make me quite secure for the lecture. It was, however, received 
exactly as I hoped — deep attention, interrupted often by applause, 
sometimes enthusiastic, and generally at the parts one most wished 
applauded. A few words from Montague Villiers ^ (in asking for 
a vote of thanks), his hope that the whole country would soon feel 
as that audience did towards a man whose long life had been 
spent in the country's service, brought a fresh burst, waving 
of hats and handkerchiefs, etc. Went to bed grateful and happy. 

In 1855, Lord John bought a country estate, Rodborough 
Manor, near Stroud in Gloucestershire, as he wished to have a 
place of his own to leave to his children. It was in the parish 
of Amberley, from which he afterwards took his second title ; 
and his eldest son, Lord Amberley, made Rodborough his 
home for some years after his marriage. 

* Afterwards Bishop of Durham. 
164 



1855-60] RODBOROUGH MANOR 165 

Lady John Russell to Lord Dufferin 

RoDBOROUGH Manor, Stroud, November 16, 1855 

Dear Lord Dufferin, — Thanks for your letter. I began to think 
you meant to disclaim all connection with your fallen chief. We 
have just been, he and I alone, spending a week in London. In that 
little week he underwent various turns of fortune — hissed one night 
(though far less than the papers said), cheered the next day by four 
thousand voices, while eight thousand hands waved hats and hand- 
kerchiefs. I was not at Guildhall, but was at Exeter Hall, which 
was just as it should be ; for, in spite of a great many noble and 
philosophical sentiments, which I always keep in store against the 
hissing days, and find of infinite service, I prefer being present on 
the cheering days. I hope you will think his lecture deserved its 
reception. His squiredom agrees with him uncommonly. He 
rides and walks, and drinks ale and grows fat. As for me, I have 
not been at all strong since I came here, but I hope I am reviving 
now, and shall soon be able thoroughly to enjoy a life happy and 
pleasant beyond expression — such peace of mind and body to us 
both, such leisure to enjoy much that we both do enjoy with all 
our hearts and have been long debarred from, are blessings of no 
small value, and when people tell me, by way of cheering me up 
under a temporary disgrace, that he is sure to be in office again 
soon, they little know what a knell their words are to my heart. 
However, die sara, sara, and in the meantime we are very happy. 
Yesterday I required some excitement, I must say, to carry me 
through the day, for alas ! I struck forty ! Accordingly the 
children had provided for it unknown to me, and acted Beauty 
and the Beast with rapturous applause to a very select audience. 
. . . We are much pleased with our new home, green and cheer- 
ful and varied and pretty outside, snug and respectable inside. 

Ever sincerely yours, 

F. Russell 

PS. — I hear you are going to be married to a great many 
people ; please let me know how many reports are true. 

In 1856 Lady John and the children went abroad. They 
visited Lady Mary Abercromby, whose husband was British 
Minister at the Hague, and later on they joined Lord John 
at Antwerp. Thence they travelled to Switzerland, where 
they remained till the end of September in a villa beautifully 
situated above the Lake of Geneva, near Lausanne. The 
early part of the winter was spent in Italy, where Lord John 
came into personal contact with Cavour and many other 



i66 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

Italian patriots, whose cause he so staunchly supported 
during the next few years. The Villa Capponi, where they 
lived at Florence, became the meeting-place of all the Liberal 
spirits in Tuscany ; and the Tuscan Government, who 
thought that Lord John had come to Florence to estimate 
the probable success of the revolutionaries, set spies upon 
his visitors. 

Lord John Russell to Lady Melgund 

Villa Capponi, December 19, 1856 

We have passed our time here very agreeably. Besides the 
Florentines and their acute sagacity, we have had here many of 
those whose wits were too bright or their hearts too warm to 
bear the Governments of Naples and Rome. ... As for the 
French newspapers, it is the custom at Paris and Vienna to let 
the newspapers attack everything but their own Government, 
which is their notion of the liberty of the Press ! 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Abercromby 

Villa Capponi, Florence, January i, 1857 

My dearest Mary, — You have my first date for the New 
Year. . . . God grant it may be a happy one to us all. We 
began it merrily. Mrs. E. Villiers, who, with her daughter, is 
spending the winter here, gave a little dance. Twelve struck in 
the middle of a quadrille, which was accordingly interrupted 
by general shaking of hands among chaperons, dancers, and all. 
There is a cordiality and ease in society abroad, the charm of 
which goes far with me to make up for the absence of some of the 
merits of society in England. The subjects of conversation 
among men are queer, no doubt ; but what people have in them 
is much easier to get at — and to me it is a relief not to hear all 
the ladies talking politics, or rather talking political personalities, 
as they do in London. 

January 2. — I am afraid, after having been abused as unworthy 
of Italy (not so much, however, by you as by Lotty and Lizzy) you 
will now charge me with the far worse sin of being a bad Briton 
— but that, depend upon it, I am not, whatever appearances may 
say — on the contrary, a better one than ever, only grieving that 
with such materials as we have at home we do not manage to make 
social life pleasanter. . . . Yesterday we had our usual Thursday 
party ; and before more than five or six had come, I went into the 
girls' sitting-room, which opens out of the drawing-room, and 
played reels while the girls and two young Italians danced — but 



1855-60] FLORENCE 167 

they had not danced long before our frisky Papa followed with 
Count Ferretti, and not only joined in a reel, but asked for a waltz, 
and whirled round and round with Georgy and then with me, and 
made the old Count do the same. It all reminded me of our Berlin 
evenings, except that Papa, though twenty-four years younger 
then, was not inspired by the German as he is by the Italian 
atmosphere, and never, to my recollection, joined us in our many 
merry unpremeditated dances. It was hardly less a wonder to see 
Henry follow the example yesterday, and add to the confusion of 
the most confused " Lancers " I ever saw danced. ... It is 
impossible to say how this letter has been interrupted. . . . The 
weather being too bright and beautiful to allow us to spend the 
morning indoors, the first interruption was a drive to San Miniato, 
where there is one of the finest views of Florence, and since we 
came home I have been jumping up every five minutes from my 
writing-table to receive one visitor after another — whereas many 
an afternoon passes without a single one — and since they all 
disappeared I have been called upon to help in a rehearsal for a 
second representation of our " Three Golden Hairs," ^ which is to 
take place to-morrow on purpose for Lady Normanby. . . . The 
gaiety and noise of the rehearsals, the fun of the preparations, and 
the shyness, which effectually prevents any good acting, all reminds 
me of our dear old Minto plays. How very, very long ago all that 
seems ! Not long ago in time only, but the changes in everybody 
and everything make the recollection almost like a dream. I was 
sorry to say good-bye to poor old fifty-six, for though not invariably 
amiable to us he has been a good friend on the whole, and one 
learns to be more than grateful for each year that passes without 
any positive sorrow, and leaves no blanks among our nearest and 
dearest. God bless you, dearest Mary ; pray attribute blots and 
incoherences to my countless interruptions. 

Yours ever affectionately, 

F. R. 



On his return, Lord John continued to give independent 
support to the Ministry until circumstances arose which 
forced him to oppose Palmerston's foreign policy. In March 
Cobden brought forward a motion condemning the violent 
measures resorted to against China. Palmerston had justified 
these measures on the ground that the British flag had been 
insulted and our treaty rights infringed by the Chinese 
authorities at Canton. A small coasting vessel called The 
Arrow (sailing under British colours, but manned by China- 

' A children's play written by herself. 



i68 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

men, and owned by a Chinaman) had been boarded while 
she lay in the river, and her crew carried off by a party 
from a Chinese warship in search of a pirate, who they had 
reason to think was then serving as a seaman on board The 
Arrow. Sir John Bowring, Plenipotentiary at Hong-Kong, 
demanded that the men should be instantly sent back. It 
was true that The Arrow had at the time of the seizure no 
right to fly the British flag, for her licence to trade under 
British colours had expired the year before ; but he argued 
that since the Chinese could not have known this when they 
raided the vessel, they had deliberately insulted the flag in 
doing so, and afterwards infringed the extradition laws by 
refusing to restore the crew immediately. Upon the British 
fleet proceeding to bombard the forts, the men were released, 
but the apology and indemnity demanded in addition were 
not forthcoming. More forts were then bombarded and a 
number of junks were sunk. The real motive of these 
aggressive proceedings lay in the fact that the English 
traders had not yet been able to get a free entrance into 
Canton, in spite of treaties permitting them to trade there. 
Sir John Bowring made the refusal of apologies an excuse 
for forcing the Chinese to admit them. Not unnaturally the 
Chinese retaliated b}^ burning foreign factories and cutting 
foreign throats. Meanwhile Palmerston at home character- 
istically supported Sir John Bowring through thick and 
thin, and the upshot was a long war with China. 

Lord John detested aggressive and violent proceedings of 
this kind. His speech on Cobden's motion was one of his 
finest. The following passage from it expresses the spirit in 
which later on he conducted the foreign policy of England 
himself : 



We have heard much of late — a great deal too much, I think 
— of the prestige of England. We used to hear of the character, 
of the reputation, of the honour of England. I trust, sir, that the 
character, the reputation, and the honour of this country are dear 
to us all ; but if the prestige of England is to be separated from 
those qualities . . . then I, for one, have no wish to maintain it. 
To those who argue, as I have heard some argue, " It is true we 



1855-60] CITY ELECTION 169 

have a bad case ; it is true we were in the wrong ; it is true that 
we have committed an injustice ; but we must persevere in that 
wrong ; we must continue to act unjustly, or the Chinese will think 
we are afraid," I say, as has been said before, " Be just and fear 
not." 

Palmerston was defeated by sixteen votes, and went to the 
country on a " Civis Romanus " policy, or, as we should say 
now, with a " Jingo " cry, which was immensely popular. Its 
popularity was so great that there seemed no chance that Lord 
John would retain his seat for the City. Even Cobden and 
Bright were defeated in their constituencies, and the country 
returned Palmerston with a majority of seventy-nine. Un- 
popular since his apparent change of front regarding the 
Vienna treaty, it would have been small wonder if Lord John 
had taken the advice of his committee and retired from the 
contest ; but he was bent on taking his one-to-hundred chance, 
and, as it turned out, his courage won the seat. 

London, March 7, 1857 

J. A. Smith called on me to know whether John had deter- 
mined what to do. Said I thought he meant to fight the battle. 
He looked most woeful, and said, " As sure as I stand here, he 
will not be the member for the City." 

I said I believed he thought it best at all events to stand. 
''' Ah, that's all very well if he had seen a chance of a tolerable 
minority — but if he has only two or three votes ! " He also said 
John had as much chance of being Pope as of being M.P. for the 
City. 

Although a lack of the faculty which conciliates indi- 
viduals was one of the criticisms most constantly brought 
against Lord John as a political leader, he certainly possessed 
the power of overcoming the hostility of a popular audience, 
without abating one jot of his own independence or dignity. 
A bold, good-tempered directness is always effective in such 
situations. He never lacked the tact of an orator. In this 
election the Liberal Committee, on the first rumour of his 
resignation, without verifying it, or notifying their intentions 
to Lord John, substituted Mr. Raikes Currie, late member for 
Northampton, as their Liberal candidate. Lord John at once 



170 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

called a meeting to protest against the action of the com- 
mittee. The following passage in his speech was received 
with enthusiastic applause, and did much to secure a favour- 
able hearing for his anti-Palmerstonian views during the cam- 
paign. It must be remembered that he had represented the 
City for sixteen years. 

" If a gentleman were disposed to part with his butler, his 
coachman, or his gamekeeper, or if a merchant were disposed to 
part with an old servant, a warehouseman, a clerk, or even a 
porter, he would say to him, " John, I think your faculties are 
somewhat decayed ; you are growing old, you have made several 
mistakes ; and I think of putting a young man from Northampton 
in your place." I think a gentleman would behave in that way to 
his servant, and thereby give John an opportunity for answering. 
That opportunity was not given to me. The question was decided 
in my absence ; and I come now to ask you, and the citizens of 
London, to reverse that decision." 

His success won back for him some of the general admira- 
tion which he had forfeited by his loyalty to the Ministers in 
1855. Many of the best men in England rejoiced in his 
triumph ; among them Charles Dickens wrote his congratu- 
lations. 

Lord John Russell to Lady Melgund 

Pembroke Lodge, April i, 1857 

. . . The contest has brought out an amount of feeling in my 
favour both from electors and non-electors which is very gratifying. 
... It is the more pleasant, as all the merchant princes turned 
their princely backs upon me, and left me to fight as I could (the 
two Hankeys alone excepted). . . . Fanny has not been very well 
since the election . . . but this blessed place will, I hope, soon 
restore her. 

Lady John Russell to Lord Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, April 4, 1857 

The City election engrossed my thoughts for many days, and 
made it difficult to write to anybody who cared as much about it 
as you till it was over. I have since spent my life in answering 
letters and receiving visits of congratulation, most of them very 
hearty and sincere, and accordingly very pleasant. I thought my 
days of caring for popular applause were over, but there was 
something so much higher than usual in the meaning of the cheers 



1855-60] LETTER FROM DICKENS 171 

that greeted John whenever he showed himself, that I was not 
ashamed of being quite dehghted. There was obviously a strong 
feeling among the electors and non-electors, in Guildhall and in 
the streets, that John had been unfairly and ungratefully set aside, 
which far outweighed the effect of his unpopular opinions on 
ballot and church rates. Altogether there was a good tone 
among the people (by which I don't mean only one of attachment 
to John) which made me proud of them. Next to the pleasure of 
seeing and hearing with my own eyes and ears how strong his 
hold upon his countrymen still is, was the pleasure I was wicked 
enough to feel at the reception which greeted the unfortunate 
Raikes Currie. 

The repose of Pemmy Lodge, which I hope you will by and 
by share with us, is very welcome after our noisy triumph. 

Mr. Charles Dickens to Lady John Russell 

May 22, 1857 

Dear Lady John, — Coming to town yesterday morning out of 
Kent, I found your kind and welcome note referring to the previous 
day. I need not tell you, I hope, that although I have not had the 
pleasure of seeing you for a long time, I have of late been accom- 
panying Lord John at a distance with great interest and satisfaction. 
Several times after the City election was over I debated with 
myself whether I should come to see you, but I abstained because 
I knew you would be overwhelmed with congratulations and I 
thought it was the more considerate to withhold mine. 

I am going out of town on Monday, June ist, to a little old- 
fashioned house I have at Gad's Hill, by Rochester, on the identical 
spot where Falstaff ran away, and as you are so kind as to ask me 
to propose a day for coming to Richmond, I should very much like 
to do so either on Saturday the 30th of this month or on Sunday 
the 31st. 

I heard of you at Lausanne from some of my old friends there, 
and sometimes tracked you in the newspapers afterwards. I beg 
to send my regard to Lord John and to all your house. 

Do you believe me to remain always yours very faithfully, 

Charles Dickens 

Lady John Russell to Lord Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, Septembet 27, 1857 

John's reception at Sheffield equalled anything of the kind I 
had ever seen in our " high and palmy " days. So little had we 
expected any reception, that when we arrived at the station and 
saw the crowds on the platform I could not think what was the 
matter, and it was not till there was a general rush towards our 



172 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

carriage and shouts of John's name that I understood it was meant 
for him. From the station we had to drive all through the town 
to Alderman Hoole's villa ; it was one loud and long triumph. 
John and Mr. Hoole and I were in an open carriage, the children 
following in a closed one. We went at a foot's pace, followed and 
surrounded by such an ocean of human beings as I should not have 
thought all Sheffield could produce, cheering, throwing up caps 
and hats, thrusting great hard hands into the carriage for John to 
shake, proposing to take off the horses and draw us, etc. Windows 
and balconies all thronged with waving women and children, and 
bells ringing so lustily as to drown John's voice when, at Mr. 
Hoole's request, he stood up on the seat and made a little speech. 
All this honour from one of the most warlike towns in the 
kingdom will surprise you, no doubt ; indeed, I am not sure that 
you will quite approve. 

Pembroke Lodge, December 25, 1857 

A bright and lovely Christmas. . . . Sat more than an hour in 
the sunny South summer-house, listening to birds singing and boys 
and little May ' talking and laughing. . . . Dear, darling children, 
how I grudge each day that passes and hurries you on beyond 
blessed childhood. ... I am too happy — there can hardly be a 
change that will not make me less so. ... A glorious sunset 
brought the glorious day to an end. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, December 26, 1857 

I cannot remember a happier Christmas than ours has been, 
and I am sure nobody can remember a milder or brighter Christmas 
sky. I sat more than an hour yesterday in the sunny South 
summer-house, listening to the songs of the blackbirds and thrushes, 
who have lost all count of the seasons, and to the merry voices of 
the boys and little May, and thinking of many things besides, and 
wishing I could lay my hand on old Father Time and stop him in 
his flight, for he cannot bring me any change for the better, and he 
must very soon take away one of the best joys of my daily life, 
since he must take away childhood from my bairnies. 

In the meantime I know I am not ungrateful, and when the 
little boys in their evening prayer thanked God for making it " such 
a happy Christmas," oh ! how I thanked Him too. We have had 
a Christmas-tree, and for many days before its appearance the 
children were in a state of ungovernable spirits, full of indescribable 
fun and mischief, and making indescribable uproar. John has 
been by no means the least merry of the party, and seeing a game 

' Mary Agatha. 



1855-60] ORSINI PLOT 173 

at " my lady's toilet " going on yesterday evening, could not resist 
tacking himself to its tail and being dragged through as many 
passages and round as many windings as Pemmy Lodge affords. 

Although the Palmerston Ministry seemed firmly seated in 
power and were certainly capable of carrying out the spirited 
and aggressive foreign policy on which they had so successfully 
appealed to the country, an unexpected event occurred during 
the recess of 1857 which led to their downfall. On the night 
of January 14th some Italian patriots threw three bombs under 
Napoleon's carriage as he was driving to the Opera. The 
Emperor and Empress had a narrow escape, and many spec- 
tators were killed or wounded. The outrage was prompted 
by a frantic notion that the death of Napoleon III was an 
indispensable step towards the freedom of Italy. Orsini, the 
leader of the conspirators, was not himself of a crazy criminal 
type. He was a fine, soldier-like fellow, who had fought and 
suffered for his country's independence, and he had many 
friends in England among lovers of Italy who never suspected 
that he was the kind of man to turn into an assassin. When 
it was discovered that the plot had been hatched in London 
and the bombs made in Birmingham, a feverish resentment 
seized the whole French Army. Addresses were sent by many 
regiments congratulating Napoleon on his escape, in which 
London was described as ce repaire d'assassins and much 
abusive language used. The Press, of course, on both sides, 
fanned the flame, and for some days the two nations were very 
near war. The French Ambassador requested the Govern- 
ment to make at once more stringent laws against refugee 
aliens, and in answer to this request Palmerston brought in a 
Conspiracy to Murder Bill. Lord John informed the Govern- 
ment that he, for his part, would oppose any such measure 
as an ignominious capitulation to a foolish outcry. 

Lady John Russell to Lady Mary Ahercromhy 

London, February 4, 1858 
I have never seen John more moved, more mortified, 
more indignant, than on reading a letter from Sir George Grey 
yesterday announcing the intention of the Ministry to make an 



174 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

alteration in the Conspiracy Laws under the threats of an 
inconceivably insolent French soldiery. He had heard a 
rumour of such an intention, but would not believe it. He 
thinks very seriously of the possible effects of debates on the 
measure, and feels the full weight of his responsibility ; but he 
is nevertheless resolved to oppose to the utmost of his power 
what he considers as only the first step in a series of unworthy 
concessions 

Pembroke Lodge, February 20, 1858 

John woke me at two with the news of a majority for the 
amendment (234 to 215) — the country spared from humiliation, 
the character of the House of Commons redeemed. But, privately, 
what will become of our victory ? Lay awake with the night- 
mare of coming office upon me — went to sleep only to dream 
that John was going to the scaffold (being interpreted, the 
Treasury Bench). 

Although the division was taken in a very small house, as 
the above figures show, Palmerston resigned, and after some 
hesitation the Queen charged Lord Derby with forming a 
Government. This was the second time Lord Derby had 
attempted to govern with a majority against him in the 
House of Commons. The first task of the new Ministry 
was to patch up the quarrel with France, and, thanks to 
the good sense and dignity of the Emperor, it was managed 
in spite of the scandalous acquittal by an English jury of the 
Frenchman, Dr. Bernard, who had manufactured Orsini's 
bombs. The Due de Malakoff, whose conduct in the Crimea 
made him a popular hero in England, replaced M. Persigny 
at the French Embassy. His presence helped to remind 
Englishmen that it was not many years since they had fought 
side by side with French soldiers, and resentment against 
the Emperor's army died away. 

Pembroke Lodge, October 30, 1858 

Dinner at Gunnersbury. Met Malakoff s, D' Israelis, Azeglio. 
Never before had opportunity for real conversation with 
D' Israeli — a sad flatterer and otherwise less agreeable than so 
able a man of such varied pursuits ought to be. 

Although these years of comparative leisure had been 
welcome to them both, the issues at stake in Europe were 



1855-60] ITALY AND AUSTRIA 175 

so important that Lord John could not help wishing he 
again had an opportunity of directly influencing events. 
He writes to his wife on December 15, 1858 : 

When I reflect that a Reform Bill and the liberation of Italy 
are " looming in the distance/' it gives me no little wish to be in 
office ; but when I consider what colleagues I should have, I am 
cured of any such wish. I can express my own opinions in 
my own way. 

He feared that he would not have hearty support from 
his colleagues in his views on Italy and Reform, which 
accounts for the above allusion. 

In March the Ministry were defeated on Disraeli's Reform 
Bill, and Parliament was dissolved. Meanwhile Italy's 
struggle against Austria was exciting much deeper interest 
than franchise questions. On June 24, 1859, the battle of 
Solferino was fought. Although the Austrians were beaten, 
the cost of victory to the Italians and French was very heavy. 
The fortunes of the whole campaign, indeed, had hitherto 
been due more to the incompetence of Austrian generalship 
than either to the strength of the allies or to the weakness of 
the Austrian position. Though Solferino was the fifth victory, 
the others had been also dearly bought, and the allies still 
remained inferior in numbers. Besides, should Austria go 
on losing ground there was more than a chance that 
Prussia would invade France, when the prospects of Italy 
would have been at an end, and England too, in all prob- 
ability, involved in a general war. Napoleon, who knew the 
unsoundness of his own army, dreaded this contingency him- 
self ; though the English Court supposed — and continued to 
suppose, strangely enough — that to provoke a war with Prussia 
was the ultimate end of his policy. Generally speaking, the 
English people were enthusiastically Italian, while the Court 
and aristocracy were pro-Austrian. " I remarked," wrote 
Lord Granville to Lord Canning at this time, "that in the 
Lords, whenever I said anything in favour of the Emperor 
or the Italians, the House became nearly sea-sick, while they 
cheered anything the other way, as if pearls were dropping 
from my lips," 



176 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

The elections did not strengthen Lord Derby sufficiently, 
and in June he resigned. 

" Lord Derby's Government was beaten this morning," writes 
Lord Malmesbury,^ " by a majority of 13. . . . The division took 
place at half -past two, and the result was received with tremendous 
cheers by the Opposition. D'Azeglio (the Piedmontese Minister) 
and some other foreigners were waiting in the lobby outside, and 
when Lord Palmerston appeared redoubled their vociferations. 
D'Azeglio is said to have thrown his hat in the air and himself 
in the arms of Jaucourt, the French attache, which probably no 
ambassador, or even Italian, ever did before in so public a place." 

It was not easy to choose Lord Derby's successor, since 
the Liberal party was divided ; but its two leaders, Palmerston 
and Lord John, agreed to support each other in the event of 
either of them being charged with the formation of the new 
Government. The Queen, either because she was reluctant to 
distinguish between two equally eminent statesmen, or because 
she did not know of their mutual agreement, or more likely 
because she did not wish the foreign policy of England to be 
in the hands of Ministers with professed Italian sympathies, 
commissioned Lord Granville to make the attempt, who, 
though he felt some sympathy for the patriots, considered 
the peace of Europe far more important than the better 
government of Italy. After he had failed she sent for 
Palmerston, under whom Lord John became Foreign 
Secretary. This change of Government had a happy and 
instant effect upon the prosperity of the Italian cause. 
Technically, England still maintained her neutrality with 
regard to the struggle between Austria and Victor Emmanuel, 
backed by his French allies ; but the change of Ministry 
meant that instead of being in the hands of a neutral 
Government with Austrian sympathies, the international 
negotiations upon which the union and freedom of Italy 
depended were now inspired by three men — Palmerston, 
Russell, and Gladstone — who did all in their power, and 
were prepared, perhaps, to risk war, in order to forward the 
policy of Victor Emmanuel and Cavour. 

* "Memoirs of an Ex-Minister." 



1855-60] ITALIAN PATRIOTS 177 

Lady John unfortunately lost her diaries recording events 
from May, 1859, to January, 1861 ; but it is known that she 
was in close sympathy with her husband's policy, and she 
looked back upon the part he played in the liberation of Italy 
with almost more pride than upon any other period of his 
career. Italian patriots and escaped prisoners from the Papal 
and Neapolitan dungeons found a warm welcome at Pem- 
broke Lodge. She was never tired of listening to their 
stories, and she felt an enthusiastic ardour for their cause. 

Pembroke Lodge, May 9, 1859 

Farewell visit from Spaventa and Dr. Cesare Braico,^ who goes 
to Piedmont Wednesday. Spaventa full of eager but not hopeful 
talk on Neapolitan prospects, Dr. Braico very quiet, crushed in 
spirits, but not in spirit. 

" For me the illusions of life are past," he said. " I have given 
the flower of my youth to my country in prison — what remains to 
me of life is hers." 

In answer to some commonplace of mine about hope he replied, 
" To those who have suffered much the word hope seems a lie. 
, . . While I was in prison my mother died — my only tie to life." 
Said he left England with regret, and should always gratefully 
remember the sympathy he had found here. Told him I thought 
there was not enough. " More than in my own country. We 
passed through four villages on our way to the port after leaving 
the prison ; not one person looked at us or gave us a word of 
kindness ; not a tear was in any eye ; not one blessing was 
uttered." I wondered. I supposed the people (the Neapoli- 
tans) were avilis. *' More than aviliti — sono ahhruttati.'" All 
these sad words, and many more, in beautiful Italian, would 
have touched any heart, however shut to the great cause for 
which he and others have given their earthly happiness, and 
are about to offer their lives. As I looked at that fine counte- 
nance, so determined, so melancholy, and listened to the words 
that still ring in my ear, I felt that, though he did not say so, he 
meant to die in battle against tyranny. He gave me some verses, 
written with a pencil at the moment, to little May, who ran into 
the room while he was here. Farewell, brave, noble spirit. May 
God be with thee 1 " 

To get clear what Lord John's share was in the creation of 
Italy, we must remember what hampered him at home and 
what difficulties he contended with in the councils of Europe. 

' Spaventa and Braico had been prisoners in Italy for about ten years. 

N 



178 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

The Palmerston Cabinet, as far as ability went, was 
exceptionally strong. Lord Granville, himself a member 
of it, had failed in his own attempt, because Lord John 
had stipulated that he should lead the Commons, and that 
foreign affairs should be in no other hands but Palmerston's ; 
while Palmerston, who was as necessary as Lord John to any 
strong Whig Government, had declined to serve unless he led 
the Commons. The motive of Lord John's demand that 
Palmerston should be Minister for Foreign Affairs is clear ; 
he did not trust Lord Granville where Italy was concerned. 
He thought extremely well of his qualifications as Foreign 
Minister — he had previously appointed him his own 
Foreign Secretary — but Lord Granville had objected shortly 
before to Lord Clarendon's dispatch to Naples, in which 
Ferdinand II's misrule had been condemned in terms such 
as might have preceded intervention. This dispatch had had 
Lord John's ardent sympathy, while Lord Granville had dis- 
approved of it on the grounds that in diplomacy threatening 
language should not be addressed to a small State which 
prudence would have moderated in dealing with a powerful 
one, and that the whole tenor of the dispatch was calculated 
to draw on a European war. 

It was these views upon Italian questions — namely, that 
peace was all-important and that little kingdoms, however 
corrupt and despotic, should not be browbeaten, which made 
Lord Granville so acceptable to the Court. Throughout the 
next two years he was the principal agent through whom the 
Queen and the Prince Consort attempted to mitigate the pro- 
Italian policy of Lord John and Palmerston. The Cabinet 
itself was divided on the subject ; the "two old gentlemen," 
as Sidney Herbert called them, were for stretching England's 
" neutrality " to mean support of every kind short of (and even 
at the risk of) committing us to intervention ; while the rest 
of the Cabinet, with the important exception of Gladstone, 
were more or less in favour of abstaining from any demonstra- 
tion on one side or the other. When Palmerston came into 
power the matters stood thus : Austria, after losing the 
battle of Solferino, was securely entrenched within her four 



1855-60] PEACE OF VILLAFRANCA 179 

strong fortresses of Verona, Mantua, Peschiera, and Legnago, 
but her Emperor was already disheartened and disgusted by 
the fighting. 

Napoleon, too, on his side was anxious for peace — most 
anxious, in fact, to extricate himself as soon as possible from 
the dangerous complications in which his alliance was likely 
to land him. On the eve of Solferino he had heard that 
Prussia, ready for war, was concentrating at Coblenz and 
Cologne, and he knew well there was no army in France 
capable of much resistance. He began, too, to realize that 
success pressed home might lead to the formation on the 
south-east border of France of a new — and perhaps formidable 
— Italian power ; a possibility he had not considered when he 
planned with Cavour at Plombieres their secret alliance 
against Austria. The war was now becoming unpopular with 
far-sighted Frenchmen precisely because its success plainly 
tended towards this issue ; and, in addition, the formation 
of such a kingdom, by implying the confiscation of the Papal 
territories, was most distasteful to his Catholic subjects, with 
whom Napoleon already stood badly and wished to stand 
better. After a brief armistice, he proposed terms of peace to 
Austria, which were signed at Villafranca on July 9th. They 
ran as follows : 

Lombardy was to be surrendered to France and then 
handed over to Italy ; the Italian States were to be formed 
into a Federation under the honorary presidency of the Pope 
(this was intended to soothe French Catholics) ; Venetia, 
while remaining under Austrian rule, was to be a member of 
the Federation, and the Dukes of Tuscany and Modena were 
to resume their thrones. Napoleon wished to add a further 
stipulation that neither side should use their armies to secure 
this latter object, but over this there rose so much haggling 
that the outcome was only an understanding between the two 
Emperors (not committed to paper) that Austria would not 
oppose the establishment of constitutional government in 
those States, should they themselves desire it, but at the same 
time she retained by her silence her right to interfere for other 
reasons ; while France on her side asserted that she would 



i8o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

neither restore the Dukes by force of arms herself nor — and 
here lay a point of great importance — allow Austria to interfere 
should she act upon the right she had reserved. 

As may be imagined, to men who had set their hearts on 
a free united Italy, such a treaty was exasperating. However 
aware Victor Emmanuel might be that he owed much to 
France, he could not but be bitterly disappointed by Napoleon 
withdrawing his help when the struggle had just begun and 
when the freedom of Lombardy alone had been won. Cavour 
resigned in a passion of resentment that Victor Emmanuel 
should have countenanced such a peace. " Siamo traditi " 
was the cry at Milan and Turin. Yet Napoleon had already 
done much for the union of Italy ; in fact, he had done more 
than he knew, and far more than he ever intended. Though 
no one at first fully realized it, the stipulation that Austria 
should not attempt to use force to restore the fugitive Dukes, 
and that France should abstain from similar interference, really 
opened a path for the union of Italy. This was the first 
important juncture at which Lord John brought valuable 
assistance to the cause of " Italy for the Italians," since he 
kept Napoleon to his promise, after he had good reasons to 
regret it, and bent the whole weight of England's influence 
towards persuading reluctant Austria to accept on her side the 
principle of complete non-intervention. 

It must be remembered that the terms of Villafranca, in so 
far as the question of armed intervention was concerned, had 
never been finally ratified ; and it was Napoleon's wish that the 
European Powers should form a Congress at Zurich, at which 
the Convention would acquire the stability of a European 
treaty, and the nature of the proposed Italian Federation be 
finally defined. Lord John and Palmerston, while protesting 
against the clause of the treaty which, by including Venice in 
the Federation, still left Austria a preponderating influence in 
Italian affairs, refused to take part in this Congress unless 
Napoleon promised beforehand to withdraw his army from 
Italy as soon as possible, and to join England in insisting that 
no Austrian troops should be allowed in future to cross the 
borders of their own Venetian territory. 



1855-60] COURT AND FOREIGN OFFICE 181 

At home the English Court did its best to prevent its 
Ministers exacting these promises. It was the Queen's strong 
wish that the Federation of Italy and the restoration of the 
Dukes of Parma and Modena should stand as Austria's com- 
pensation for yielding Lombardy to Italy, and that the Congress 
at Zurich should insist upon these conditions forming part of 
the ultimate European treaty. She objected to the pressure 
which Lord John was applying to France, on the ground that 
in making England's presence conditional upon an assurance 
that Napoleon would consider terms more favourable to Italian 
independence than those already signed at Villafranca, her 
Ministers were abandoning neutrality and intervening de- 
liberately upon the side of Victor Emmanuel. The contest 
between the Court and the Foreign Office was obstinate on 
both sides ; at one time it seemed likely that Palmerston and 
Lord John would be forced to resign. Lord John succeeded, 
however, in obtaining a favourable assurance from Napoleon 
to the effect that if it should prove impossible to construct an 
Italian Federation in which Austria could not predominate, 
he would accept a proposal for an Italian Federation from 
which Austria was excluded entirely. On these terms England 
consented to appear ; but after all these intricate delays the 
Congress, dated to meet in January, i860, never sat. In 
December a pamphlet, inspired by Napoleon himself, entitled 
" Le Pape et le Congres," had appeared, which advocated the 
Pope's abandonment of all territory beyond the limits of the 
patrimony of St. Peter, and declared that the settlement of 
this important matter should lie not with the Congress, but 
in the hands of Napoleon himself. If these were the Emperor's 
own views, Austria pronounced that she could take no part 
in the Congress ; for she would then be denied a voice in 
decisions very near her interests as a Catholic Power and the 
first enemy of Italian union. The Congress consequently fell 
through. 

Meanwhile events had been moving rapidly in Italy. 
Relieved from the immediate fear of Austrian coercion, the 
Tuscan Assembly had voted their own annexation to the 
kingdom of Piedmont, and the duchies of Modena and 



i82 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

Parma and the Romagna soon followed suit. The question 
remained, could Victor Emmanuel venture to accept these 
offers ? He had the moral support of England on his side, 
and in his favour the threat of Napoleon that should Austria 
advance beyond her Venetian territory, the French would 
take the field against her ; but on the other hand, Austria 
declared that if the King of Piedmont moved a single soldier 
into these States she would fight at once, and Napoleon, while 
he threatened Austria, did not wish Victor Emmanuel to 
widen his borders. Cavour was now again at the head of the 
Piedmontese Government, and the problem of British diplo- 
macy was to propose terms so favourable to Italian liberty 
that Cavour would not be tempted to provoke another war 
as a desperate bid for a united Italy, and yet of a kind that 
France and Austria would accept. The terms Lord John 
offered were : (i) that Austria and France should both agree 
to abstain from intervention, except at the invitation of the 
five Great Powers ; (2) that another vote should be taken in 
those States which had desired to amalgamate with Piedmont 
before the King should be free to enter their territories. The 
other provisions dealt with the preservation of the status quo 
in Venetia and the withdrawal of the French troops from 
Rome and Northern Italy. 

It will be seen that the first clause was merely a reiteration, 
a reinforcement with Europe to back it, of the clause which 
Napoleon, blind to its results, had attempted to induce the 
Emperor of Austria to put upon paper at Villafranca. Having 
failed then, he had contented himself with announcing that 
he would not interfere himself, nor allow Austria to interfere, 
by force of arms in Italy, a promise to which English 
diplomacy had from that moment firmly held him. We 
have seen, too, that before Lord John had consented to take 
part in the Zurich Congress, he had exacted from Napoleon 
an assurance that he would consider, as an alternative to the 
Federation proposed at Villafranca, the formation of an Italian 
Federation in which Venice (or in other words Austria) should 
have no part whatever. Such a Federation would not have 
been very different from the amalgamation with Piedmont 



1855-60] THE MAKING OF ITALY 183 

which the other States had just proposed of their own accord; 
and consequently the Emperor of the French could not well 
protest against Lord John's proposals without repudiating all 
his earlier negotiations. Thus England and Italy now held 
France on their side, an unwilling ally in diplomacy, and 
Austria, on whom Lord John had endeavoured all along to 
force the principle of non-intervention, at last gave way. 
She refused, however, to commit herself for the future, or to 
admit that she had not the right to interfere at any time in 
Italy's affairs ; but she let it be known that, for the present, 
reluctance to renew war with France and Piedmont would 
determine her actions. Of course the people of the States 
confirmed their vote in favour of annexation, and on April 2, 
i860, the first Parliament representing Piedmont and Central 
Italy met at Turin. 

This was the first stage in the making of Italy. When it 
was completed there remained only three independent Powers 
(excluding Austrian Venice) dividing the peninsula among 
them — in the north the new kingdom of Piedmont ; in the 
centre the diminished Papal States ; in the south the kingdom 
of Naples. Lord John, as the spokesman of England, by 
playing off Napoleon, who was no friend to Italian unity, 
against Francis Joseph, who was the prime enemy of Italian 
freedom, had secured for Italy an opportunity to work out 
her own salvation. He and Cavour together had forced 
Napoleon to prevent Austria from checking what Napoleon 
himself would have liked to prevent. 

Subsequently it came to light that Napoleon's surprising 
readiness in agreeing to the annexation of Central Italy in 
April had been due to a private arrangement between him and 
Cavour in the previous month. It was agreed between them 
in March that Savoy and Nice should be handed over to 
France as the price of her acquiescence. In the secret treaty 
of Plombieres, Napoleon's reward for helping the Piedmontese, 
should the war leave Venice, Lombardy, and the Romagna in 
Victor Emmanuel's hands, had been fixed as the cession of 
these territories to France. But since Napoleon had with- 
drawn and made peace when, as yet, only Lombardy had been 



i84 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

wrested from Austria, he had waived his claim upon Nice and 
Savoy at Villafranca, and claimed in exchange a contribution 
towards his expenses in the war. But the moment Piedmont 
proposed to annex Tuscany, the Romagna and the Duchies, 
he returned to his original claim. His action had two im- 
portant results : one which immediately added to the com- 
plication of Italian politics, and one which affected the 
diplomatic relations of the Great Powers for the next eleven 
years. In Italy his demand made a lasting breach between 
Cavour and Garibaldi. The latter never forgave the cession 
of Nice, his native town, to France, and never could be con- 
vinced that the sacrifice of Italian territory was a necessary 
step towards uniting Italy. In his eyes the agreement with 
Napoleon had been a kind of treason on the part of Cavour. 
Among the European Powers, on the other hand. Napoleon's 
action created an impression, which was never effaced, that he 
was a predatory and treacherous power. 

In England the news was received with the greatest indig- 
nation. Lord John was extremely angry, and practically 
threatened war. He, like Garibaldi, did not realize that 
Cavour was driven to the concession, nor that Napoleon was, 
in truth, compelled on his side to demand what he did. The 
following letter from Sir James Hudson, the English Minister 
at Turin — " uomo italianissimo," as Cavour called him — is 
particularly interesting, because, though addressed to Lady 
John, it reads as though it were also intended for the eyes of 
the Foreign Secretary, from whom indignation had temporarily 
concealed the truth that this sacrifice was the only compensa- 
tion which would have induced Napoleon to look on quietly 
while the new kingdom of Italy was consoHdating on his 
frontier. The last event Cavour desired was a war between 
the two Powers whose unanimity forced neutrality upon 
Austria. Napoleon on his side was practically obliged to 
demand Savoy and Nice as a barrier against Italy, and because 
the acquisition of territory alone could have prevented his 
subjects from feeling that they had lost their lives and money 
only to further the aims of Victor Emmanuel. 



1855-60] THE MAKING OF ITALY 185 

Sir James Hudson to Lady John Russell 

Turin, April 6, i860 - 

My dear Lady John, — I have seen Braico — Poerio brought 
him to me after I had offered my services to him in your name, 
and we have combined to dine together and to perform other 
feats, besides gastronomic ones, in order to cheer him whilst he 
resides in these (to a Parthenopean) Boeotian regions. 

You mention in your letter the name of that scandal to royalty, 
Louis Napoleon. What can I say of him ? Hypocrite and foot- 
pad combined. He came to carry out an " idea,'' and he prigs 
the silver spoons. " Take care of your pockets " ought to be the 
cry whenever he appears either personally or by deputy. 

But do not, I beg of you, consider and confound either the King 
of Sardinia or Cavour as his accomplice. Think for a moment on 
the condition of Sardinia, who represents the nascent hope of Italy. 
Think of the evil that man meant — how he tried to trip up the 
heels of Tuscany, establish a precarious vicarial existence for the 
Romagna, and plots now at Naples. Not to have surrendered 
when he cried " stand and deliver " would have been to have 
risked all that was gained — would have given breathing time to 
Rome, reinforced and comforted Rome's partisans in the 
Romagna — have induced doubt, fear, and disunion throughout 
Italy. Judging by the experience of the last eight years, I must 
say I saw no means of avoiding the rocks ahead save by a sop to 
Cerberus. But do not lose confidence in the National party — 
Cavour or no Cavour, Victor Emmanuel or another, that party is 
determined to give Italy an Italian representation, I regret that 
the Nizzards (who have a keen eye to the value of building lots) 
are wrenched from us by a French filou ; but I cannot forget that 
the Savoyards have constantly upheld the Pope, and have been 
firm and consistent in their detestation of Liberal Government in 
Sardinia. / am not speaking of the neutral parts, please remember. 

Your most devoted servant, 

James Hudson 

Meanwhile the reign of Francis II of Naples and the Two 
Sicilies, who had succeeded Ferdinand, was proving if any- 
thing worse than his father's. Early in i860 insurrections 
began to break out in Sicily, and on May 5th Garibaldi, on 
his own initiative, set sail from Genoa to help the rebels. 
" I go," he said, " a general without an army, to fight an army 
without a general." His success was extraordinarily rapid. 
At the end of May he had taken Palermo from 24,000 regular 
troops with his volunteers and some Sicilian help, thus making 



i86 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

the dictatorship of Sicily, which he had declared on landing, 
a reality. It soon became known that he intended to recross 
to the mainland to free the people of Naples itself. Piedmont, 
of course, wished Garibaldi to succeed in this further under- 
taking. His cause was her cause. Though this action was 
entirely independent, his dictatorship had been avowed as 
a preliminary step to handing over the island to Victor 
Emmanuel. The King could not, therefore, oppose him nor 
prevent him re-embarking for Naples without separating 
himself from the cause of United Italy and making an enemy 
of almost every patriot in the country ; but both he and 
Cavour were afraid either that Garibaldi might fail, in which 
case the union of Italy would have been postponed for 
many years, or that the pace at which changes were coming 
would lead France or Austria to interfere again. 

France, of course, was most anxious to stop the further 
increase of the power of Piedmont, and therefore to check 
Garibaldi. Napoleon's idea of " United Italy " was a federation 
of seprrate States under the presidency of the Pope, who in 
his turn would be under the influence of France. He at once 
put pressure upon Cavour and Victor Emmanuel, compelling 
the latter to write to Garibaldi, telling him to stop in Sicily. 
Thus, in spite of her desire that Garibaldi should sail and 
succeed. Piedmont was compelled publicly to express dis- 
approval of his intention. In England it was supposed 
that Cavour meant what he made the King say in his letter 
to Garibaldi, and in addition Palmerston, who was glad 
enough to see the old Governments of the little States tumb- 
ling to the ground, was rather alarmed at the prospect of a 
United Italy, which would also be a Mediterranean Power. 
Hitherto the honour of assisting Italy had belonged equally 
to him and to Lord John. Henceforward, however. Lord 
John, who had been brought up in the Fox tradition, and 
whose Italian sympathies had been fortified by his wife's 
enthusiasm, definitely took the lead in determining England's 
policy. 

The aim of avour was to help the revolution as much as 
possible without making it obvious to Europe that he was 



1855-60] THE MAKING OF ITALY 187 

doing so ; but, like everybody else, Lord John had taken him at 
his word, and thought that the liberation of Italy might be 
retarded by Garibaldi's departure from Sicily for the main- 
land, till information reached him that in reality Piedmont was 
most anxious nothing should hinder Garibaldi's attack upon 
Naples. It reached him apparently in the following manner. 

Cavour determined to appeal to the Russells personally 
through a secret agent. With this object Mr. Lacaita [after- 
wards Sir James Lacaita], who had been exiled from Naples 
for having helped Gladstone to write his famous letters upon 
the state of the Neapolitan prisons, which Lacaita knew from 
inside, was instructed to call upon Lord John in London and 
to tell him that in spite of her official declaration. Piedmont 
was desperately anxious that Garibaldi should drive the King 
of Naples from the throne ; for Garibaldi's extraordinary 
success in Sicily had made his failure on the mainland far less 
likely, and Cavour was now certain that there was not much 
power of resistance left in the Neapolitan kingdom. Lacaita, 
though ill in bed, got up and went to deliver his message. 
He was told that Lord John was closeted with the French and 
Neapolitan ambassadors and could not see him. Lacaita 
guessed that Lord John was at that very moment talking 
over the means of preventing Garibaldi's expedition, and he 
immediately decided to ask for Lady John. When informed 
that she was seriously ill, he insisted upon being taken up into 
her bedroom, and adjured her for the love of Italy to get Lord 
John away from the ambassadors at once. A scribbled note 
begging her husband to come to her immediately brought him 
upstairs in some alarm. And there he learnt from Lacaita 
that Victor Emmanuel's letter of July 25th was a blind, that 
united Italy must be made now or never, and that he would 
never be forgiven if England stopped Garibaldi. 

This incident is recorded by several persons to whom Mr. 
Lacaita told the story.^ It explains the sudden right-about of 
English diplomacy at this juncture, which, as Persigny shows 
in his memoirs, puzzled and astonished him. For Lord John 

^ Lady John's diaries of i860 being lost, this incident is given here on 
the sole authority of the late Sir James Lacaita. 



i88 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1855-60 

having received this information, refused to act with France 
in preventing Garibaldi from crossing the Straits of Messina. 
This he accordingly did, and marched straight on to Naples, 
where he was welcomed as a deliverer ; the royal troops 
deserted or retreated to Capua, and Garibaldi made his 
entrance into Naples, as was said in the House of Commons, 
" a simple traveller by railway with a first-class ticket." Before 
the end of October the King of Sardinia and Garibaldi met 
near Teano and Garibaldi saluted Victor Emmanuel as King 
of Italy. 

On October 27, i860, Lord John wrote a dispatch, in 
which he said that — 

Her Majesty's Government can see no sufficient grounds for 
the severe censure with which Austria, France, Prussia, and Russia 
have visited the acts of the King of Sardinia, Her Majesty's 
Government will turn their eyes rather to the gratifying prospect 
of a people building up the edifice of their liberties and con- 
solidating the work of their independence. . . . 

Lord John also quoted from "that eminent Jurist Vattel" 
the following words : " When a people from good reasons 
take up arms against an oppressor, it is but an act of justice 
and generosity to assist brave men in the defence of their 
liberties." 

Mr. Odo Russell to Lord John Russell 

Rome, December i, i860 
My dear Uncle, — Ever since your famous dispatch of the 
27th, you are blessed night and morning by twenty millions of 
Italians. I could not read it myself without deep emotion, and 
the moment it was published in Italian, thousands of people copied 
it from each other to carry it to their homes and weep over it for 
joy and gratitude in the bosom of their families, away from brutal 
mercenaries and greasy priests. Difficult as the task is the 
Italians have now before them, I cannot but think that they will 
accomplish it better than we any of us hope, for every day con- 
vinces me more and more that I am living in the midst of a great 
and real national movement, which will at last be crowned with 
perfect success, notwithstanding the legion of enemies Italy still 
counts in Europe. 

Your affectionate nephew, 

Odo Russell 



1855-60] GARIBALDI 189 

Such was the second important juncture at which the 
British Ministry came to the rescue of the Itahan nationahsts. 
If after Villafranca the negotiations which secured the safety of 
Italy were the work of three men, Palmerston, Lord John, and 
Gladstone, contending against an indifferent and timid Cabinet 
and the opposition of the Court — it is clear that when the 
success or failure of Italian unity was a second time at stake, 
the decision and initiative were Lord John's. 

After his retirement, when he was travelling with his family 
in 1869, they took a villa at San Remo. The ceiling of the 
salon was decorated with those homely frescoes so common 
in Italy, which in this case consisted of four portraits — Garibaldi, 
Cavour, Mazzini, and — to their surprise — Lord John himself. 
Next to the national heroes he was associated closest in the 
minds of the people with the achievement of their inde- 
pendence. 

When Garibaldi came to England in the spring of 1864, 
and received a more than royal welcome, Pembroke Lodge 
was, naturally, one of the first houses he visited. On April 21, 
1864, Lady John writes in her diary : 

All looked anxiously to the sky on getting up — all rejoiced to 
see it bright. Sunshine the whole day. Garibaldi to luncheon at 
Pembroke Lodge. Our school children, ranged alongside of 
approach with flags, cheered him loudly. All went well and 
pleasantly. 

John gave him a stick of British oak. Garibaldi gave John his 
own in exchange. 

Agatha gave him a nosegay of green, red, and white — he 
kissed her on the forehead. Much interesting conversation with 
him at luncheon. Told him he would be blamed by many for 
his praise of Mazzini yesterday. He said that he and Mazzini 
differed as to what was best for Italy, but Mazzini had been his 
teacher in early youth — had been unjustly blamed and was 
malheureux. "Etj'ai cru devoir dire quelque chose," and that 
he (Garibaldi) had been in past years accused of being badly 
influenced by Mazzini : "Ceux qui ont dit cela ne me connaissent 
pas." That when he acts it is because he himself is convinced he 
ought. Inveighed bitterly against Louis Napoleon, whom he looks 
upon as hors la lot. Simple dignity in every word he utters. 

Park full of people. Richmond decorated with flags. 



CHAPTER X 

1859-66 

SINCE only political events in which Lady John was her- 
self deeply interested or those which affected her life 
through her husband's career are here to the purpose, the 
other international difficulties with which Lord John had 
to deal as Secretary for Foreign Affairs in this Government 
may be quickly passed over. And for the same reason the 
domestic politics of these years require only the briefest 
notice. Palmerston's Ministry produced very little social 
legislation, and the fact that Lord John was at the Foreign 
Office, while the Prime Minister led the Commons, increased 
the legislative inactivity of a Government which, with Palmer- 
ston at its head, would in any case have changed little in the 
country. Gladstone's budgets and Cobden's Free-Trade Treaty 
with France were the important events. Between i860 and 
1864 the taxation of the country was reduced by twelve 
millions, the National Debt by eleven millions, and the nation's 
income increased by twenty-seven millions, while foreign trade 
had risen in two years by seventy-seven millions. These were 
the most splendid results a Chancellor of the Exchequer has 
ever been able to show ; but the changes by which it had 
been achieved had been far from welcome to Palmerston him- 
self. It had required great resolution on Gladstone's part to 
carry the Prime Minister with him. 

Many comments have been made on the indifference which 
the country showed to domestic reform during these years of 
Liberal Government ; but it is not very surprising. It is a 
familiar fact that when foreign affairs are exciting the people are 
not eager about social or political reform, a fact upon which 

Governments have always been able to count. And foreign 

190 



1859-66] DEATH OF LORD MINTO 191 

affairs had been very exciting. Under Lord John and Palmer- 
ston our own foreign policy had been bold and peremptory ; 
the policy of France was directed by Napoleon, whose head, 
as Palmerston said, was as full of schemes as a rabbit-warren 
is of rabbits ; and the quarrel of 1852 between Prussia and 
Denmark had arisen again in a far acuter form. It was, 
therefore, natural that popular attention should be constantly 
turned abroad. 

The deaths of those who linked Lady John with her child- 
hood now came quickly. Her father, Lord Minto, died a 
month after Lord John had taken office. He had been 
ailing for some time. 

London. — Pembroke Lodge, May 2, 1859 

John at 7 a.m. to Huntingdon to propose Mr. Heathcote at 
nomination ; back to Pembroke Lodge about five, having been very 
well received, but chiefly by the ill-dressed. Papa surprisingly 
well — saw him on my way out of town ; far the happiest sight I 
had yet had of him. Dear Papa, he looked so pleased, smiled so 
brightly when he saw me. " Ah, dear Fanny ! How glad I am 
to see you! How fresh and well you look." Held my hand all 
the time I was with him. ... I said I hoped in his place I should 
be as patient — that he was an example to us all, as he always had 
been. . . , Said few daughters could look back at my age without 
being able to remember having heard from their father one word 
but of love and kindness. . , . 

He died on July 31, 1859. His keen interest in pubhc 
questions continued to the end, with a firm belief in the 
ultimate triumph of good. " Magna est Veritas et prevalebit " 
were almost the last words he spoke on his deathbed. 

During the autumn of i860 Lord John accompanied the 
Queen to Coburg, where boar-shooting with the Prince 
Consort and Court-life (he never liked its formalities) failed to 
console him for absence from wife and children. 

Lady John to Lord John Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, October 11, i860 
I found two letters from you here. ... So you are fairly on 
your journey and safe so far. And here I am with my large 
detachment, all well and merry, and all at dear beloved home 



192 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

again after our wanderings. I am so thankful, and I hope to be 
still more so in five days, when I am no longer doomed to sing 
"There's nae luck about the house," as I have done daily for 
three weeks. . . . That you should have killed a wild boar is all 
but incredible, and makes me expect to see you with a long 
moustache and green Jdger costume. 

In April, 1861, Lord John's second daughter, Victoria, 
married Mr. Villiers, son of the Bishop of Durham. Lady 
John wrote some verses to her on her marriage which are 
published in Walpole's " Life of Lord John Russell." 

In May the Duke of Bedford died. The Duke had been 
Lord John's close friend, and had often advised him at the 
beginning of his career. He was one of those influential 
noblemen who watch politics with unflagging interest, but 
without the smallest desire to take an active part in them. It 
was his pride and pleasure to know the ins and outs of a 
situation perhaps even better than some of the principal actors 
in it, and his judgment was always at his brother's service. 
On his death Lord John inherited the Ardsalla estate in 
Ireland. The loss of his brother precipitated perhaps an 
intention he had considered for some time of saving his 
strength by accepting a peerage, and exchanging the strenuous 
life of the House of Commons for the lighter work of the 
House of Lords. The exchange was effected in July, when 
Lord John became Earl Russell. 

" Very dismal about the peerage," writes Lady John in her 
diary, " and seeing only the sad side of it. . . . John made a 
fine speech on Sardinia, perhaps his last in the House of 
Commons." 

Lady Minto ^ to Lady John Russell 

July 20, 1 86 1 
... It is impossible not to feel very sad in parting with a 
name which has so long been the rallying point of the Liberal 
party, the watchword of all those who in our day have fought the 
good fight, and, whatever name he may bear, it will never carry 
to English ears the same sound as " Lord John." People older 
than ourselves had looked to it with hope ; and in our time, when- 

' Formerly Lady Melgund. Her husband had now succeeded his father 
as third Earl of Minto. 



1859-66] PEERAGE 193 

ever Liberty has been in danger, or truth or justice or the national 
honour has been attacked, the first question which rose to men's 
Hps was, " What will Lord John do ?".... I remember his first 
speech on the China War in 1856. How empty the House was 
when he rose, how rapidly it filled to overflowing ; then the 
intense silence which followed the rush, and lastly the overpower- 
ing cheers from all sides as he went on. To leave the scene 
where he has so long wielded at will the, alas ! not fierce 
" democracie " (and it will be milder still without him !) must 
require immense self-control and self-denial. 

Lord John Russell to Lady Minto 

London, July 23, 1861 
My dearest Nina, — It seems very bad of us not to have 
explained duly and deliberately that I have the project resolved 
upon and decided of accepting a peerage. But there have been 
many changes in my mind before the final leap was resolved upon. 
Forty-seven years of the House of Commons are enough for any 
man, and imply a degree of wear and tear which those who read 
the speeches listlessly at the breakfast table have little conception 
of. A reply which is to go to Paris, Petersburg, Turin, and 
Washington requires much presence of mind, and often much 
previous thought, work, etc. A calmer atmosphere will suit 
better my old age, but I could not leave my companions on the 
Treasury Bench while any change was impending, and if I were 
to wait till 1862 I might again find the ship in a storm, and be 
loath to take to the boat. About a title for Johnny there is still 
some doubt, but I shall be Earl Russell, and make little change in 
the signature of 

Your affectionate brother, 

J. Russell 

In August Lord and Lady Russell and their children went 
to Abergeldie Castle, which had been lent to them for several 
successive autumns. Their free and happy life in the High- 
lands was delightful to them all. In October Lady Russell 
v/rites : " Left our beautiful Highland home. . . . Very very 
thankful for all our happy Abergeldie days." 

In the April of this year the American Civil War had 
broken out, and the Ministry had been obliged to decide the 
question whether England should recognize the Southerners 
as " belligerents " or accept the Northern view of them as 
"rebels." The touchiness of the Northerners, and the fact 
that in England many people sympathized loudly with the 



194 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

South, made it difficult for the Ministry to maintain the 
attitude of neutrality, which, while recognizing the Southern 
Confederacy as a belligerent Power, they had officially declared 
in May. In November two Commissioners, sent by the Con- 
federacy to put the case of the South before the Courts of 
Europe, were forcibly seized on board the Trent, an English, 
and therefore a neutral, vessel. This was a breach of inter- 
national law, and the resentment it provoked in England was 
increased by the truculent attitude of the North in the face of 
our demand for the restoration of the Commissioners. The 
Congress, instead of apologizing, proceeded to pass a vote of 
thanks to Captain Wilks for having intercepted the Trent. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline^ 

Pembroke Lodge, December 13, 1861 
When the account of the seizure of the Southern Commis- 
sioners first reached us I was afraid of the effect on John's health 
and spirits, as you may well believe ; but, as you say, he could not 
but feel that there had been no fault on our side, that not a word 
had been spoken, not a deed done by him but what showed the 
friendliest feeling to the United States, and the strongest wish to 
remain at peace with them. I wish the newspapers were blame- 
less ; but there was a sneering, exulting tone in many of them 
after the military disasters of the North which was likely to 
irritate. Mr. Motley said long ago that the Times would, if 
possible, work up a war between the two countries, and though 
I can't speak from my own knowledge, as I have seldom looked at: 
its articles, I have no doubt from what John and others say that 
he was right. . . . There can be no doubt that we have done 
deeds very like that of Captain Wilks — not exactly like, because 
no two cases ever are so — but I wish we had not done them, and 
I suppose and hope we shall admit they were very wrong. It is. 
all terrible and awful, and I hope and pray war may be avertedl 
— and whatever may have been the first natural burst of indigna- 
tion in this country, I believe it would be ready to execrate the; 
Ministry if all right and honourable means were not taken to 
prevent so fearful a calamity. 

December 19, 1861 

John to town to see Mr. Adams.=^ . . . John's interview with 
Mr. Adams encouraging. Mr. Adams showed him a dispatch 

' Her husband, Mr. Ralph Abercromby, was now Lord Dunfermline. 
' American Minister in London. 



1859-66] DEATH OF PRINCE CONSORT 195 

from Mr. Seward declaring Government to be quite uncommitted 
as to opinion on seizure of Commissioners. 

In December the Prince Consort died. Almost his last 
public act was to modify the dispatch sent in reply to the 
vote in Congress, so that it offered the North an opportunity 
of relaxing with dignity their uncompromising attitude. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, December 24, 1861 
I know you, like everybody, must have been thinking much of 
our poor desolate Queen. Her anguish, her loneliness of heart on 
that pinnacle of human greatness, must weigh on all who have 
known how happy she was ; but to us who have often seen that 
lost happiness, it is almost like a grief of our own. I don't 
believe I have ever seen her take his arm without the thought 
crossing my mind : " There is the real blessing of your life — 
that which alone makes you as happy a woman as others 
in spite of your crown." Everybody must have been full of 
dread of the effect upon her, but she has borne up nobly — or 
rather, she has bowed humbly to God's will, and takes comfort 
in her children. It must be soothing to her that his rare worth 
is now fully acknowledged and gratefully felt by the whole nation. 

January 7, 1862 

John to town at twelve, back at half-past six ; dispatches and 
letters from Lord Lyons of December 26th discouraging, cabinet 
still considering our demands. Surrender possible, but in Lord 
Lyons's opinion very unlikely. 

January 8, 1862 

Telegram to John at 6 p.m. Commissioners surrendered ! 
Thank God. General rejoicing in the House. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, January 13, 1862 

Well, what do you say to our American triumph ? It ought to 
go far to cure you all. It is long since any poHtical event has 
given me, my particular self, such unmixed pleasure. For my 
country, for my husband, and for the other country too, with all its 
sins, I rejoice with all my heart and soul. John is delighted. He 
was very anxious up to the last moment. 

. . . We " Plodgians " were all so delighted that it has been a 
surprise to us to hear of the very tempered joy, or rather the ill- 
concealed disappointment, of London society ; but John says London 
society is always wrong, and I believe the country to be all right. 



196 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

London, February 10, 1863 
You ask me about Kinglake's book — everybody except ourselves 
is reading or has read it. . . . With regard to the sleepy Cabinet 
dinner at Pembroke Lodge he has from what wt hear fallen into 
great inaccuracy. . . . John says that the despatch, having been 
circulated in the Cabinet before that dinner, was already well 
known to them all. As far as he remembers none but Sir William 
Molesworth went to sleep. I remember perfectly how several of 
them told me afterwards about Sir William sleeping and falling 
from his chair, and we have often laughed about it, but I do not 
remember being told of anybody else going to sleep. I suppose 
I shall read the book, but I cannot tell you how I shrink from 
anything that must recall and make one live over again those 
terrible months of vacillation and weakness, the consequence of 
a Coalition Cabinet, which " drifted " us into a most terrible war — 
a war from which consistency and firmness would have saved us. 
A thoroughly Aberdeen Ministry would have maintained peace. A 
thoroughly Russell or Palmerston Ministry would have maintained 
peace and honour too. 

Lord Russel to Lady Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, J^uly 9, 1863 
Parliament is coming to an end, most people being tired of 
talking and everybody of listening. . . . Lord Chelmsford says in 
honour of the House of Lords : " The Commons have a great deal 
to do and they don't do it — the Lords have nothing to do and 
they do it." 

In 1863 relations between England and America were 
again strained. English vessels were perpetually running 
the blockade to bring cotton to England and goods to the 
Southern ports — a risky but highly profitable business. They 
were often captured by Northern cruisers and forfeited. 
There were complaints on our side that the Federal courts 
were not always careful to distinguish in their decisions 
between cases of deliberate blockade-running and legitimate 
trading with ports beyond the Southern frontier. The North, 
besides blockade-running, had a further cause of complaint. 
The Confederates were getting cruisers built for them in 
neutral ports. The most famous case of the kind was that of 



1859-66] AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 197 

the Alabama, which was built in the Mersey. The English 
Government had information of its destination, but failed to 
prevent it sailing — a failure which eventually cost us an 
indemnity of ^^3, 000,000. The speech referred to in the 
following letter was made in the midst of these troubles. It 
was a defence of England's good faith in the matter of the 
Alabama and an assertion that Americans should be left to 
settle their own difficulties without European mediation. 
At this time the French Government and a strong party 
in England were in favour of European intervention. By 
securing the independence of the South, they hoped to 
diminish the power of the United States in the future. Such 
an idea could only be entertained while the struggle between 
North and South seemed evenly balanced. The next year 
showed the hopelessness of such a project and vindicated 
the wisdom of the English Government in having refused to 
attempt to divide America into two independent Powers. 

Mr. William Vernon Harcourt {later Sir William) to Lady Russell 

September 28, 1863 
I hope you will excuse my taking the liberty to write you a line 
of admiration and satisfaction at Lord Russell's speech at Meiklour 
[in Scotland], which I have just read. I take so deep and lively 
an interest in the great American question and all that concerns 
it that I looked forward to the authorized exposition of English 
policy by the Foreign Secretary with the greatest anxiety. Lord 
Russell's speech, will, I am sure, be of immense service both to 
Europe and to America. It has the Juste milieu, and withal does 
not suppress the sympathy which every good man must feel for the 
cause of freedom, in a manner which more than ever justifies the 
Loch Katrine boatman's opinion of his " terrible judgment." 

I cannot help feeling that this speech has for the first time 
publicly placed the position of England in its true light before 
the world, and I with many another one am very grateful for it. 
Among all Lord Russell's many titles to fame and to public grati- 
tude, the manner in which he has steered the vessel of the State 
through the Scylla and Charybdis of the American War will, 
I think, always stand conspicuous. . . . Now I am going to ask 
a great favour. I saw at Minto a copy of verses written for the 
summer-house at Pembroke Lodge, of which I formed the highest 
opinion. May I have a copy of them ? I should really be most 
sincerely grateful and treasure them up amongst the things I 
really value. 



198 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

These are the lines referred to by Mr. Harcourt : 

To J. R. 
Pembroke Lodge, J^une 30, 1850 

Here, statesman, rest, and while thy ranging sight 

Drinks from old sources ever new delight 

Unbind the weary shackles of the week. 

And find the Sabbath thou art come to seek. 

Here lay the babbling, lying Present by. 

And Past and Future call to counsel high ; 

To Nature's worship say thy loud Amen, 

And learn of solitude to mix with men. 

Here hang on every rose a thorny care. 

Bathe thy vexed soul in unpolluted air. 

Fill deep from ancient stream and opening flower. 

From veteran oak and wild melodious bower, 

"With love, with awe, the bright but fleeting hour. 

Here bid the breeze that sweeps dull vapours by, 

Leaving majestic clouds to deck the sky, 

Fan from thy brow the lines unrest has wrought, 

But leave the footprint of each nobler thought. 

Now turn where high from Windsor's hoary walls, 

To keep her flag unstained thy Sovereign calls ; 

Now wandering stop where wrapt in mantle dun, 

As if her guilty head Heaven's light would shun, 

London, gigantic parent, looks to thee. 

Foremost of million sons her guide to be ; 

On the fair land in gladness now gaze round. 

And wish thy name with hers in glory bound. 

With one alone when fades the glowing West, 

Beneath the moonbeam let thy spirit rest, 

While childhood's silvery tones the stillness break 

And all the echoes of thy heart awake. 

Then wiser, holier, stronger than before, 

Go, plunge into the maddening strife once more ; 

The dangerous, glorious path that thou hast trod, 

Go, tread again, and with thy country's God. 

F. R. 

WoBURN Abbey, August 18, 1864 

My dear, dear husband's birthday. [He was seventy-two.] 
I resolved not to let sad and untrustful thoughts come in the way 
of gratitude for present happiness, and oh ! how thankfully I 
looked at him with his children around him. They made him 
and me join them in a match at trap-baU that lasted two hours 
and a half. He, the boys, Johnny and Agatha rode. Mademoiselle 



1859-66] PARLIAMENT DISSOLVED 199 

and I drove in the same direction. He and his cavalcade were 
a pleasant sight to me. He looked pleased and proud with his 
three sons and his little daughter galloping beside him. The day 
ended with merry games. 

In September, 1864, came the news of Lord Amberley's 
engagement to Lord Stanley of Alderley's daughter. He was 
at that time only twenty-one. Lady Russell's feeling about it 
is shown in the following letter : 

Lady Russell to Lady Georgiana Russell 

North Berwick, September 21, 1864 

My dearest Georgy, — Your long and dear letters were a 
great pleasm^e to me, showing how you are thinking and feeling 
with us about this event, so great to us all. Whatever pangs 
there may be belonging to it, and of course there are some, are 
lost and swallowed up to me in great joy and gratitude. We 
might have wished him to many a little later, to have him a little 
longer a child of home. But, on the other hand, there is some- 
thing to me very delightful in his marrying while heart and 
mind are fresh and innocent and unworldly, and I even add 
inexperienced — for I am not over-fond of experience. I think 
it just as often makes people less wise as more wise. There is 
more real truth in their ** Ideale" than in what follows. . . . God 
bless you, dear child. 

Your very loving 

Mama 

In July, 1865, Parliament was dissolved, the Ministry 
having held office for six years. They had lost prestige 
over the Schleswig - Holstein negotiations. Lord Derby, 
with justification, denounced their policy as one of " meddle 
and muddle," and Palmerston only escaped a vote of 
censure in the Commons by being able to point to the 
prodigious success of the Ministry's finance. His personal 
popularity and ascendancy, however, were as great as ever ; the 
Liberals were returned by a majority of sixty-seven. Although 
this majority must have been more than they looked for, the 
election disappointed Lord Russell in two respects : Gladstone 
lost his seat at Oxford and Lord Amberley was beaten at 
Leeds. Before Parliament met Palmerston fell seriously ill. 



200 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

Pembroke Lodge, October 19, 1865 

Letter from the Queen at Balmoral to John telling him she 
means to ask him to carry on the Government in case of Lord 
Palmerston's death. Dearest John very calm and virithout the 
oppressed look and manner I always dread to see. 

On the i8th of October Palmerston died. Had he taken the 
precautions usual at the age of eighty, he might have lived 
longer, but in private as in public life, he despised caution. 
He was one of those statesmen whom modern critics, on the 
watch for the partially obsolete and with the complexity of 
present problems always before them, tend to depreciate. 
He had the first quality which is necessary for popularity : 
he was readily intelligible. In addition he was prompt, 
combative, and magnanimous ; shrewd, but never subtle ; 
sensible, but not imaginative. He had no ideas which he 
wished to carry out ; he did not like ideas. He wanted 
England to dominate in Europe and to use her power good- 
naturedly afterwards ; to be, in fact, what a nobleman may 
be in his home-country, where he is universally looked up to 
and ready to take immense trouble to settle fairly disputes 
between inferiors. Opposition from a direction making it 
savour of impertinence he stamped upon at once, without 
imagining the provocation or ideas from which it might 
possibly spring ; he could not understand, for instance, that 
there might be two sides to the Chinese War. It is probable, 
too, that had not the Prince Consort intervened to soften the 
asperity of the Government's protest against the seizure of 
the Confederate emissaries on board the Trent, we should 
have had war with the Northern States. This menacing, 
peremptory attitude in diplomacy served him well, till 
Bismarck crossed his path. In the encounter between the 
man with a great idea to carry out, who had taken the 
measure of the forces against him, and the man who had 
only, as it were, a dignified attitude to support in the eyes 
of Europe, the odds were uneven, and Palmerston was 
beaten. 

Lord Russell, though he must have been among the few 
who knew the Prime Minister had been failing lately, writes 



1859-66] RUSSELL PRIME MINISTER 201 

that his death came with a shock of surprise, he was so full 
of heart and health to the last. 

Lord Russell now became Prime Minister, and Lord 
Clarendon took his place at the Foreign Office. 

Pembroke Lodge, November 2, 1865 

John to town at twelve, back at half-past five, having taken 
leave of the dear old Foreign Office and left Lord Clarendon 
there. Happy, happy days, so full of reality — the hours of 
work so cheerfully got through, the hours of leisure so delightful. 
Sometimes when I walk with my dear, dear husband and see my 
lovely Agatha bounding along with sparkling eyes and rosy cheeks, 
and the bright sun shining on the red and yellow trees, I can only 
feel the sunshine of life and forget its autumn leaves. Or when 
we sit together by our evening lire and talk, as our moods or 
fancies lead us, of things grave or gay, trifling or solemn, my heart 
seems to leap within me from the sense of happiness, and I can 
only utter silent and humble thanks to the Almighty Giver. It 
must end, oh, fearful thought ! — parting and death must come ; 
fearfully yet not despairingly I think of that end. Come when or 
how it will, it cannot take all away — this happiness, this unutter- 
able gratitude is not for time only, but is mine for ever. 

The succession of Lord Russell to Palmerston's place at 
the head of the Government implied a change in its character 
and policy. It was not merely a continuation of an old, 
but practically the formation of a new Government. Lord 
Russell was bent upon introducing a Reform Bill, and thus 
closing his career in forwarding the cause in which he had 
won his earliest and most famous laurels, and for which he had 
on two other occasions striven without success. But though 
the country was now in a mood for such measures, and 
Gladstone's speeches in favour of an extension of the franchise 
had been well received, the party which had been elected in 
support of Palmcrston was largely composed of men who 
shared his indifference, if not his dislike, to all such proposals. 
In all probability the Ministry was therefore doomed to a 
short life. " Palmerston," wrote Lord Clarendon to Lord 
Granville, " held a great bundle of sticks together. They 
are now loosened and there is nobody to tie them up." ^ In 

* " Life of Lord Granville," by Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice. 



202 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

any case such a Bill would require very careful steering. 
The first ominous sign of a split occurred when it became 
necessary to fill the vacancy caused by the retirement of 
Sir Charles Wood. A place in the Cabinet was offered to 
Mr. Lowe, but he refused on the ground that he could not 
support Reform. Lord Russell, with characteristic abruptness 
and without consulting his colleagues, then offered the place 
to Mr. Goschen, who was quite unknown to the public ; 
he had only been three years in Parliament, and held a 
subordinate office. ^ The choice was an admirable one, 
but to those who had not read Mr. Goschen's book 
upon Foreign Exchanges the appointment might well seem 
inexplicable. 

London, February 3, 1866 

Sir Charles Wood ^ called — wished to see me alone — chiefly 
in order to talk about John, his occasional sudden acts without 
consulting colleagues, and the bad effect of so acting. He gave 
some instances, in which he was quite mistaken, some in which he 
was right. The subject was a difficult one for me — but his inten- 
tions were very kind, and as I heartily agree with him in the main, 
we got on very well, and as a wife I was glad to have the oppor- 
tunity of saying some things of my dearest, dearest John, who is 
not always understood. Sir Charles took my hand, kissed it, and 
said : " God bless you." 

Early in March Lady Russell writes to her son Rollo, at 
Harrow, of a very agreeable evening at Chesham Place, when 
Mr. Froude and Mr. Bright were among her guests. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

March i, 1866 
I wish you had been here at the Friday dinner. ... It was 
such a pleasant little dinner. Bright was between Johnny and 
me ; . . . his conversation is interesting ; he is warm hearted and 
very much in earnest. We talked of Milton, Shakespeare, and 
poetry in general ; he has intense admiration for Milton, as 
a man and as a poet, as he ought to have ; but agreed with 

' Promotion so rapid has only occurred once or twice in Parliamentary 
history. See note, Morley's " Life of Gladstone," vol. ii, p. 156. 
* Sir Charles Wood retired with the title of Lord HaUfax. 



1859-66] REFORM BILL 203 

me that it is less improbable that the world should produce 
another Milton than another Shakespeare. He said reading 
poetry was the next to the greatest pleasure he had in life — the 
greatest was little children. These refined and amiable tastes are 
not what the common world would attribute to Bright, who is 
better known for determination and pugnacity. 

Although Lord Russell and Lord Derby were the two 
leaders of their respective parties, they were no longer the 
principal men on either side. The centre of interest lay in the 
House of Commons, and Gladstone and Disraeli were now 
the antagonists whom everybody watched. On March 12th 
the Government's Reform Bill was introduced in a speech by 
Gladstone, which was chiefly remarkable for lacking his 
usual fervour. The cause of this want of ardour on his part 
lay in the nature of the Bill itself. In order to conciliate the 
apathetic or hostile section of the party, the Cabinet, against 
the advice of Lord Russell and the inclinations of Gladstone 
had separated the franchise question from their redistribution 
scheme, which ought to have been an integral part of any 
Reform Bill capable of meeting the needs of the country. 
The grievances which such a Bill would aim at mitigating, 
although less gigantic than those which called for removal at 
the time of the first Reform Bill, were still serious enough. In 
1865 "there was not one elector for each four inhabited houses, 
and five out of every six adult males were without a vote.''^ 
But in addition to this the large increase in population had 
been very unevenly distributed, with the result that large 
towns like Liverpool were palpably under-represented. The 
franchise had been fixed by the first Reform Bill at ;^io 
a year rental. The Bill which Gladstone brought forward in 
the Commons proposed to reduce the county franchise 
from ;^5o to £14, and the borough franchise from ;^io to 
£'j rental. Gladstone wished to make the payment of rates 
qualify a man for a vote ; but this change was thought to 
be too radical, and any lowering of the qualifying sum of 
£'j rental would, it was found, place the working-classes in 
command of a majority in the towns — a result which the 
' Spencer Walpole, " The History of Twenty-five Years." 



204 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

Cabinet was not ready to face. Moderate as the measure 
was, it was received with bitter hostility, while its half- 
heartedness roused little enthusiasm among the keener 
Liberals of the party. The debates upon the first and second 
readings were remarkable for energy of attack from the dis- 
affected section of the old Palmerstonian party, nicknamed 
the " Adullamites." Mr. Lowe's speeches from "the cave 
of Adullam," " to which every one was invited who was 
distressed, and every one who was discontented,"^ are still 
remembered as among the most eloquent ever delivered in 
the House of Commons. The second reading passed by so 
narrow a majority that the Government thought it prudent 
to rally their reliable supporters, and meet just criticisms 
upon the inadequacy of their Bill, by bringing forward a 
redistribution measure and incorporating it with their fran- 
chise proposals. For a time this served to help them. By 
declaring that they would also stand or fall by the redistribu- 
tion clauses of their Bill, they at any rate showed a better 
front to the Opposition. Towards the end of June, how- 
ever, they were beaten in committee by eleven ; their defeat 
being principally due to the attacks and manoeuvres of Mr. 
Lowe and Mr. Horsman, who had been Irish Secretary in 
Palmerston's first Ministry. 

Lady Russell to her two sons at Harrow 

March 15, 1866 

. . . Horsman and Lowe are both Liberals ; Horsman used, I 
think, to be reckoned Radical. But both have taken a violent 
dislike to Parliamentary Reform, and certainly one would not guess 
by their speeches that they were liberal in anything. Mr. Lowe's 
was a very clever speech ; Bright's very clever too, and very good. 
Of course the Bill does not satisfy him ; but his honest support of 
it, being all in the right direction, is creditable to him and very 
useful to the measure. Your Papa is much pleased with the whole 
debate, thinking it a very good one (excellent speeches for and 
against the measure), and the result probably favourable to it. As 
to the likelihood of its passing, opinions vary. I hear that 
Lord Eversley (the late Speaker) says he would take a good 
big bet that it won't pass. Your Papa says he is ready to bet 

' John Bright's speech. 



1859-66] SPEECHES IN PARLIAMENT 205 

against him that it will. Will Ministers dissolve Parliament if 
beaten ? To that I must answer I don't know. I heard Mr. Glad- 
stone's speech. As Willy says, the latter part was very eloquent. 
It was all good ; but the details of a Suffrage Act are tiresome, and 
the apparent indifference, or even apathy, of our side of the House 
allowed even the striking passages with which the speech was 
interspersed to fall dead. The passages were striking, but nobody 
seemed to be struck. I don't believe the real feeling is one of 
dislike to Reform ; but that, of course, they don't like to show, as 
the greater part of them, in spite of dislike, will support it. Your 
classical hearts must have enjoyed Mr. Gladstone's " ligneus equus '* 
quotation ; but I am afraid Mr. Lowe's continuation was better. I 
never, or seldom, like quotations that merely illustrate what the 
subject of discussion does not resemble — they are forced and 
without much point ; but when Mr. Lowe likens our Reform Bill 
to the " monstrum infelix," and hopes it will not succeed in 
penetrating the ''muros" of the Constitution (isn't that pretty 
nearly what he said ?) there is wit and point in the quotation.* 

Mr. Charles Dickens to Lady Russell 

Glasgow, April 17, 1866 
My dear Lady Russell, — ... In sending my kindest regards 
to Lord Russell, let me congratulate you on the culminating victory 

^ Gladstone, in his apologetic introductory speech, had declared that no 
one could regard the Bill as a Trojan horse, which the Government was 
introducing surreptitiously within the citadel of the Constitution. "We 
cannot say : 

' Scandit fatalis machina muros 
Foeta armis.' " 
(The fated engine climbs our walls, big with arms.) 

Mr. Lowe retorted : 

" That was not a very apt quotation ; but there was a curious felicity 
about it which he [Mr. Gladstone] little dreamt of. The House remem- 
bers that, among other proofs of the degree in which public opinion is 
enlisted in the cause of Reform, is this — that this is now the fifth Reform 
Bill which has been brought in since 1851. Now, just attend to the sequel 
of the passage quoted by the right honourable gentleman : 

' O Divum domus Ilium et inclyta bello 
Mcenia Dardanidum ! Quater ipso in limine portae 
Sustitit, atque utero sonitum quater arma dedere.' 
(O Troy, house of gods and Dardanian city famous in war ! four times in 
the very gateway it stood, and four times the clash of arms sounded 
in its womb.) 

But that is not all : 

' Instamus tamen immemores, caecique furore, 
Et monstrum infelix sacrata sistimus arce.' " 
(Yet we, thoughtless and blind with enthusiasm, urged it on, and in our 
hallowed citadel stationed the ill-omened monster.) 



2o6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

before him, and on the faith and constancy with which the country 
carries him in its great heart. I have never felt so certain of any 
pubhc event as I have been from the first that the national honour 
would feel itself stung to the quick if he were in danger of being 
deserted. ... 

Dear Lady Russell, 

Ever faithfully yours, 

Charles Dickens 
London, April 19, 1866 

Political prospects not brightening. John and his Ministry 
will be in such an honourable position, whether they stand or fall, 
that no serious danger threatens the country if they fall. My only 
anxiety is lest John should be disappointed and depressed ; and it 
was with a sense of relief of which he was little aware that I heard 
him say yesterday of his own accord, as he looked out of 
window at the bright sunshine, '' I shall not be very sorry — it's 
such fine weather to go out in." 

London, June 19, 1866 

At 7.30 a note was brought to John from Mr. Gladstone, 
Government beaten by eleven. Happily Gladstone, though 
ambiguous in one sentence as to the importance of the vote, was 
not so in others — or at all events was understood to mean " stand 
or fall." 

Cabinet at 2.30 resolved that John should write to the Queen 
to offer resignations. Queen meantime writes from Balmoral, 
foreseeing the defeat, that she will not accept the resignations. 

Dearest John not depressed, though very sorry for this defeat of 
his hopes. He will stand well with the country, and that he feels. 

The Queen could not understand the necessity of her 
Ministers' resignation. The amendment upon which they had 
been defeated by so small a majority seemed to her a matter 
of small importance compared with events which made con- 
tinuance in office desirable. For Bismarck had just declared 
war upon Austria, and the failure of Overend and Gurney had 
thrown the City into confusion. After a delay of more than a 
week, however, she was compelled to accept their resignations, 
which had been tendered as early as June 19th. 

Pembroke Lodge, June 28, 1866 

John so well and happy that my joy in his release becomes 
greater every hour. There is a sense of repose that can hardly be 
described — abounding happiness in his honourable downfall that 
cannot be uttered. 



1859-66] THE GOVERNMENT RESIGNS 207 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, June 30, 1866 
As I wrote to you last in a doubting and disagreeable state 
of mind, I am in a hurry to write again, being now perfectly 
certain that the blessings of the resignation far outweigh its 
pains. I do not care for the charge of fickleness which may 
with justice be made against me. I can only confirm it. The 
defeat made me very wae. I hoped for many days that John 
could honourably remain in office. . . . On the day of the resigna- 
tion he was serious — perhaps sad — and so was I. The next day 
everything, including his face, looked brighter, and has gone on 
brightening ; so that now I am only afraid of being too much up- 
lifted by our downfall, and hardly have words enough to describe 
my relief and joy. All the best men are full of approbation of his 
conduct. He and Mr. Gladstone have given an example to the 
country worth more than a Reform Bill. A short Tory reign will 
strengthen the Whig party ; a good strong Whig Opposition will 
prevent much Tory mischief, so that there is little regret on public 
grounds to mix with my unbounded joy on our private account. 
Seven years of office had made me aware of its advantages and 
its interest, and I saw that John liked it, and I thought I did ; but 
now I see that he has had enough of it, and any fear I may have 
had that he might regret it is for ever gone, and I have found out 
how entirely it was an acquired taste with me. I can't say how 
often we have already said to one another, ** Now that we are 
out," as a preface to something pleasant to be done. He said to 
me this morning, "The days will not be long enough now." That 
" now " would surprise those people who may imagine that time 
will hang heavy on his hands. He is in excellent spirits. . . . We 
feel as if fetters had been struck off our minds and bodies. If 
God grants us health, how happy we may be, dearest Mary ! I 
have said far too much on this subject, but you will understand 
how I have reason to be both sadder and gladder than other 
Ministers' wives. 

Prussia and Italy had declared war against Austria, 
Hanover, Bavaria, and Hesse on the day the Russell Govern- 
ment was defeated. At Custozza the Italians were badly 
beaten by the Austrians, under the Archduke Charles. 

Alas, alas ! for poor Italy ! Alas for everybody engaged in 
this most wicked and terrible German war ! Surely it is all 
wrong that two or three bad, ambitious men should be able to 
cause the death and misery of thousands upon thousands. Our 
day at Harrow, Agatha with us, was very happy. I never had 
heard John so heartily cheered by the boys. 



2o8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1859-66 

He was in his seventy-fourth year, and he was never again 
to bear the cares of office. That summer they went down to 
Endsleigh, which they had not visited since the first years of 
their marriage. 

Endsleigh, August 4, 1866 

John, Georgy, and I here about 7.30, after a beautiful journey. 
Lovely Endsleigh ! it is like a dream to be here. . . . Thoughts 
of the old happy days haunting me continually. To church, to 
Fairy Dell. Places all the same — everything else altered. 



CHAPTER XI 
1866-70 

DURING 1866 Lord Russell finished his " Life of Fox." 
In the autumn and winter he and his family travelled 
in Italy, where they were often feted by the people of the 
towns through which they passed. At the close of the seven 
weeks' war Austria had ceded Venetia to Italy, and on 
November 7th they witnessed the entry of Victor Emmanuel 
into Venice as King of all Italy. It was a magnificent and 
most impressive sight. Lord Russell was full of thankfulness 
and joy at the deliverance of Venetia from foreign rule, and 
the triumph of a free and united Italy. 

In the memoir of Count Pasolini by his son (translated by 
the Countess of Dalhousie) the following passage occurs : 

Lord John Russell was then in Venice, and came to view the 
pageant from our windows in Palazzo Corner. When my mother 
saw this old friend appear with the tricolor upon his breast, she 
said, " Fort bien. Milord ! nos couleurs italiennes sur votre cceur ! " 
He shook her by the hand, and answered, *' Pour moi je les ai 
toujours portees, Comtesse. Je suis bien content de vous trouver 
ici aujourd'hui ; c'est un des plus beaux jours de notre siecle ! " 

Somebody then said to Lord Russell what a pity it was that the 
sun of Italy did not shine more brightly to gild the historical 
solemnity. "As for that," said he, "England shows her sympathy 
by sending you her beloved fog from the Thames." 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Venice, November 8, 1866 
We are all enchanted with this enchanting place. . . . Thurs- 
day (yesterday) was the grand and glorious sight — how grand and 
glorious nobody who has not been here and probably nobody who 
p 203 



210 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

has can conceive. . . . Newspapers will tell you of the countless 
gondolas decorated with every variety of brilliant colours — alike 
only in the tricolor flag waving from every one of them — and 
rowed by gondoliers in every variety of brilliant and picturesque 
garb — and they will tell you a great deal more ; but they cannot 
describe the thrill of thousands and thousands of Italian hearts at 
the moment when their King, " il sospirato nostro Re," appeared, 
the winged Lion of St. Mark at one end of his magnificent gondola, 
a statue of Italy crowned by Venice at the other. So spirit-stirring 
a celebration of so great an event we shall never see again, and I 
rejoice that our children were there. 

Lord Russell to Lady Minto 

Venice, November 11, 1866 

. . . We have been delighted with this place, but especially 
with being here to see the crowning of the edifice of Italian 
Independence. The people have rather their hearts full than 
their voices loud. When the Italian flag was first raised none of 
the crowd could cheer for weeping and sobbing. It is a mighty 
change. . . . We have seen many pictures. I am exceedingly 
struck with the number of fine pictures, the magnificent colouring, 
and the large conceptions of the Venetian painters — faulty in draw- 
ing very often, as Michelangelo said long ago, but wonderfully 
satisfying to the imagination. 

They returned to England early in 1867. 

It was a critical time in the history of the franchise. 
Neither Lord Derby nor his followers liked Reform, but the 
workmen of England were at last set upon it, and Disraeli 
realized that only a party prepared to enlarge the franchise 
had any chance of power. Unlike his colleagues, he had no 
fear or dislike of the people. His imagination enabled him 
to foresee what hardly another statesman, Conservative or 
Radical, supposed possible, that the power of the Democracy 
might be increased without kindling in the people any desire 
to use it. He divined that the glamour which wealth and 
riches have for the majority of voters would make it easy to 
put a hook in the nose of Leviathan, and that the monster 
might be ultimately taken in tow by the Conservative party. 
His first move in the process of "educating his party" was to 
offer the House a series of Resolutions upon the principles of 
representation. These were intended to foreshadow the 



i866-7o] DISRAELI'S REFORM BILL 211 

nature of the Government's proposals and also to prepare 
their way. By this device he hoped to raise the Bill above 
party conflict, and to lead the more Conservative of his 
followers up a gently graduated slope of generalities till they 
found themselves committed to accepting a somewhat demo- 
cratic measure. His plan was frustrated by the determination 
of the Opposition to force the Government to show their hand 
at once. 

He consequently placed before his colleagues a measure 
which based the franchise on the occupation of houses rated 
at £^f coupled with several antidotes to the democratic ten- 
dencies of such a change in the shape of " fancy franchises," 
which gave votes to men of certain educational and financial 
qualifications. His proposals seem to have been accepted by 
the Cabinet with reluctant and hesitating approval. On 
examining more carefully the effects of the -^5 franchise 
upon town constituencies Lord Cranborne (afterwards Lord 
Salisbury) retracted his previous assent, and Lord Carnarvon 
followed his lead. 

On the very day that Lord Derby and Disraeli were pledged 
to define their measure they found themselves threatened with 
the resignation of two most important members of the Govern- 
ment. At a hasty Cabinet Council, held just before they were 
to speak, it was agreed, after about twenty minutes' discussion, 
that the borough rental should be raised to £6. The Opposi- 
tion, however, declared a £6 franchise to be still too high, 
and they were now backed by a considerable section of the 
Conservative party itself, who felt that when once they were 
committed to Reform it would at least be wise to introduce a 
measure Hkely to win them popularity as reformers. Lord 
Derby and Disraeli yielded to pressure from within their 
party, and Lord Cranborne, Lord Carnarvon, and General Peel 
resigned. The subsequent history of the Bill consisted in a 
series of surrenders on the part of Disraeli. All the clauses 
and qualifications which had originally modified its democratic 
character were dropped, and Gladstone succeeded in carrying 
nearly all the amendments his first speech upon the Bill had 
suggested. 



212 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

When the Bill finally passed Lord Salisbury described it 
as a measure based upon the principles of Bright and dictated 
by Gladstone ; and what many Conservatives thought of 
Disraeli's conduct is reflected in the speeches of their ally 
Lowe : " Never, never was tergiversation so complete. Such 
conduct may fail or not ; it may lead to the retention or loss 
of office; but it merits alike the contempt of all honest men 
and the execration of posterity." ^ Gladstone, writing to Dr. 
Pusey at the end of the year, said: "We have been passing 
through a strange, eventful year : a deplorable one, I think, 
for the character and conduct of the House of Commons ; 
but yet one of promise for the country, though of a promise 
not unmixed with evils." The feeling of romantic Tories in 
the country is expressed in Coventry Patmore's poem " 1867," 
which begins : 

In the year of the great crime, 

When the false English Nobles and their Jew, 

By God demented, slew 

The Trust they stood twice pledged to keep from wrong. 

The last and longest struggle took place over the com- 
pound householder. On May 17th Mr. Hodgkinson proposed 
and carried an amendment that in a Parliamentary borough 
only the occupier should be rated, thus basing, in effect, the 
franchise upon household suffrage, and forcing upon Disraeli 
a principle which he had begun by announcing he would 
never accept. To make the following letters intelligible it is 
only necessary to add that in 1866 Lord Amberley had been 
returned to Parliament as Radical member for Nottingham : 

Lord Russell to Lady Georgiana Russell^ 

Pembroke Lodge, January 22^ 1867 
My dearest Georgy, — I have been very negligent in not 
writing to you before, as I meant to do, but laziness after exertion 
is very pleasant. My exertion was not small, as, besides speaking 
at the beginning of the evening, I sate up for the division, and did 
not get home till near four in the morning. The triumph was 

* Morley's "Life of Gladstone," vol. ii, p. 235. 
= This letter ought to be dated July 22, 1869, and addressed to Lady 
Georgiana Peel. It refers to the debate on the Irish Church Bill. 



i866-7o] DEBATES ON REFORM 213 

very great ; Derby and Cairns and the foolish and wicked Tories 
were beat, and the wise and honest Tories, Hke SaHsbury and 
Carnarvon, helped the Liberals to defeat them. . . . We shall 
have a great fight in Committee ; but I still trust in a reasonable 
majority for not pushing amendments too far, and then the Bill 
will be a great triumph of sense over nonsense. . . . We had 
Dickens Saturday and Sunday — very agreeable and amiable. . . . 

Your affectionate father, R. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

37 Chesham Place, Belgrave Square, S.W., 

February 21, 1867 

. . . Your Papa and I dined yesterday with Lord and Lady Cork. 
I heard some funny stories of Mrs. Lowe. . . . Here's the best. 
Mr. Lowe was talking of the marriage service, of the absurdity of 
making everybody say, " With all my worldly goods I thee endow" 
— " For instance, I had not a penny." Mrs. L. : " Oh, but Robert, 
you had your brains ! " Mr. L. {sharply) : "I'm sure I didn't 
endow you with them." Very funny ; but very cruel, too, in 
answer to what was meant so affectionately. . . . Now, I must 
get ready to walk with your Papa. He keeps well and strong, in 
spite of the cloudy political atmosphere (hazy, perhaps, rather 
than cloudy) — nobody thinking or feeling anything clearly or 
warmly, except him and Gladstone and a score or two of others. 
He feels that the Government has so discredited itself and the 
Tory party generally, that the Whig party might be in a capital 
position if it chose. But the general indifference of Whig M.P.'s 
to Reform, and their selfish fear of dissolution, come in the way of 
public spirit and combined action. 

Your Papa is writing to Mr. Gladstone, from whom he has 
just received an account of the debate. Disraeli's clever and 
artful speech appears to have had more effect on the House (and 
even on our side of it) than is creditable. . . . Johnny has made 
a very good impression — so we hear from Mr. Brand, Hastings,* 
Mr. Huguesson, and Gladstone — by his maiden speech. All these, 
except Gladstone, heard it, and concur in warm praise, both of 
matter and manner. It is a great event in his life, and I am so 
thankful it is well over. 

Lord Russell to Lady Minto 

London, May 21, 1867 
My dear Nina, — As you have been so much bothered with 
the compound householder, you will be glad to learn that he 
is dead and is to be buried on Thursday. It was supposed he 

^ Afterwards Duke of Bedford. 



214 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

was the last and best product of civilization ; but it has been found 
out that he was a son of Old Nick, and a valiant knight of the 
name of Hodgkinson has run him through the body. 

The Duke of Buccleuch, with whom Fanny and I have been 
having luncheon, says that Dizzy is like a clever conjuror. " Is 
that the card you wished for, sir ? — and is that yours, and yours, 
and yours ? " But politics are rather disgusting than otherwise. 
. . . Fanny and I went yesterday to see the Queen lay the first 
stone of the Hall of Science and Art.^ It was a grand sight — great 
respect, but no enthusiasm, nor occasion for it. 

Lotty is going to give us dinner to-morrow. I call her and 
Mary, L'Allegra e la Penserosa. Fanny : " And what am I ? " 
" L'Allegra e Penserosa." I have no more nonsense to tell you. 
I should like to go to Paris in July or August, but can we ? Let 
me know when you will be there. 

Your faithful 

Trusty Tomkins 

A few weeks later he wrote again to Lady Minto : "Our 
Reform Bill is now brought to that exact shape in which Bright 
put it in 1858, and which he thought too large and demo- 
cratic a change to be accepted by the moderate Liberal party. 
However, nothing is too much for the swallow of our 
modern Tories." 

In August, 1867, Lord Russell's eldest daughter, Georgiana, 
married Mr. Archibald Pee],^ son of General Peel, and nephew 
of the statesman, Sir Robert Peel. 

The daughters, who had now left the old home, were 
sadly missed, but intimate and affectionate intercourse with 
them never ceased. Lady Russell's own daughter, the 
youngest of three families — ten in all — thought in her early 
childhood that they were all real brothers and sisters, a 
striking proof of the harmonious happiness of the home. 
In November, 1867, Lady Victoria Villiers wrote to Lady 
Russell : " How I long to make our home as pure, as high 
in its tone and aims, as free from all that is low or even 
useless for our children, as our dear home was to us." 

On Lord Russell's birthday, August 18, 1867, Lady Russell 
wrote in her diary : 

» The Albert Hall. 

' The marriage service was at Petersham, in the quaint old village 
Church, hallowed by many sacred memories. 



i866-7o] DISRAELI PRIME MINISTER 215 

My dear, dear husband's birthday. Each year, each day, makes 
me feel more deeply all the wonderful goodness of God in giving 
me one so noble, so gentle, so loving, to be my example, my happi- 
ness, my stay. How often his strength makes me feel, but try to 
conquer, my own weakness ; how often his cheerfulness and calm- 
ness are a reproach to my anxieties. Experience has not hardened 
but only given him wisdom. Trials have taught him to feel for 
others ; age has deepened his religion of love. All that so often 
lowers commoner natures has but raised his. 

In February, 1868, Lord Derby resigned, owing to ill 
health. " With Lord Derby [says Sir Spencer Walpole ^] a 
whole race of statesmen disappeared. He was the last of the 
Prime Ministers who had held high office before the Reform 
Act of 1832 ; and power, on his fall, was to be transferred to 
men not much younger in point of years, but whose characters 
and opinions had been moulded by other influences. He was, 
moreover, the last of the Tories. He had, indeed, by his own 
concluding action made Toryism impossible ; for, in 1867, he 
had thrown the ramparts of Toryism into a heap, and had 
himself mounted the structure and fired the funeral pile." 
Disraeli succeeded him as Prime Minister. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

Chesham Place, February 18, 1868 

. . . Lord Derby is supposed to be dying, I am sorry to say. 
It is horrible to hear the street criers bawling out in their catch- 
penny voices, " Serious illness of Lord Derby." I feel for his wife 
and all belonging to him without any of the flutter and anxiety 
about your father which a probable change of Ministry would 
have caused a few years ago. He will never accept office again. 
This is right, I know, and I am thankful that on the conviction of 
its being so he has calmly made up his mind — yet there is deep 
sadness in it. The newspapers are not favourable to his pam- 
phlets on Ireland [three pamphlets published together afterwards 
under the title, *' A letter to the Right Hon. Chichester Fortescue "J. 
He does not care much about this, provided men in Parliament 
adopt his views or something like them. 

We find London very sociable and pleasant . . . people all 
looking glad to meet, and fresh and pleasant from their country 
life, quite different from what they will be in July. . . . 

* " The History of Twenty- five Years," vol. ii, p. 287. 



2i6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

Lady Russell, as well as her husband, was always anxious 
to encourage perfect freedom and independence of thought 
in her children. The following passages are from a letter to 
her daughter on her fifteenth birthday : 

37 Chesham Place, March 28, 1868 
. . . Every day will now bring you more independence of 
mind, more capacity to understand, not merely to adopt the 
thoughts of others, to reason and to form opinions of your own. 
I am the more sure of this, that yours is a thoughtful and reflective 
mind. The voice of God may sometimes sound differently to you 
from what it sounds even to your father or to me ; if so, never be 
afraid to say so — never close your mind against any but bad 
thoughts ; for although we are all one in as far as we all partake 
of God's spirit, which is the breath of life, still the communion of 
each soul with Him is, and must be, for that soul alone. . . . 
Nothing great is easy, and the greatest and most difficult of all 
things is to overcome ourselves. . . . Life is short, and we do 
well to remember it, but each moment is eternal, and we do still 
better to remember that. . . . Heaven bless j^ou and guide you 
through the pleasures and perplexities, the sorrows and the joys, 
of this strange and beautiful world, to the source of all light, and 
life, and goodness, to that Being whose highest name is Love. 

The everlasting Irish question had been coming again to 
the front. During 1867 the Fenians had attempted to get 
the grievances of Ireland redressed by adopting violent 
measures. There had been an attempt upon the arsenal at 
Chester, numerous outrages in Ireland, an attack at Man- 
chester upon the prison van, in which two Fenian leaders 
were being taken to prison, and a subsequent attempt to 
blow up Clerkenwell jail. The crisis had been met by sus- 
pending the Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland. Lord Russell, 
when Prime Minister, had replaced Sir Robert Peel, as Chief 
Secretary, by Mr. Chichester Fortescue, who later received the 
same office from Mr. Gladstone. In February, 1868, Lord 
Russell published his letter to Mr. Fortescue advocating 
Disestablishment in Ireland, but declaring himself in favour 
of endowing the Catholic Church with part of the revenues 
of the disestablished Church. In April Gladstone succeeded 
in carrying three Resolutions against the Government on the 
Irish Church question, and though Disraeli tendered his 




? w 






o fe 



^ 5 






I866-70] CHURCH AND STATE 217 

resignation, dissolution was postponed until the autumn. The 
same month Lord Russell presided at a meeting in St. James's 
Hall in support of Disestablishment. At the general election 
in the autumn the Liberals came in with a large majority ; 
Gladstone became Prime Minister, and in the following year 
carried his Bill for the Disestablishment of the Irish Church.^ 
Lady Russell's views on the question of Church and State 
are shown in the following letter : 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, May 20, 1868 
My dearest Mary, — . . . How can one write letters in such 
weather as we have had ? A fine May is surely the loveliest of lovely 
things, and the most enjoyable, at least to lucky mortals like our- 
selves who are not obliged to be ** in populous city pent " — and 
those who have never seen Pemmy Lodge in its May garments of 
lilac, laburnum, wild hyacinth, hawthorn, and the tender greens of 
countless shades on trees and shrubs, are not really acquainted 
with it. ... I have been going through the contrary change from 
you as regards Church and State. I thought I was strongly for 
the connection (at least of a Church with the State, certainly not 
the Church of England as it now is), but reflection on what the 
history of our State Churches has been, the speeches in St. James's 
Hall of the Bishops fostered by the State, and Arthur Stanley's 
pamphlet, which says the best that can be said for connection, and 
yet seems to open my eyes to the fallacy of that best, and the 
conversations I hear, have opened my eyes to the bad principle 
at the very root of a State Church. If all who call themselves 
teachers of religion could be paid, it might be very well, best of 
all perhaps ; but I'm afraid there are difficulties not to be got over, 
and the objections to the voluntary system diminish on reflection. 
. . . This new political crisis raises John's hopes a little ; but he 
has small faith in the public spirit of the Liberal party, and even 
now fears some manoeuvre to keep Dizzy in. 

Ever, dearest Mary, your most affectionate sister, 

F. Russell 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, December 3, 1868 

My dearest Mary, — Yesterday's Pall Mall and Sir David 

Dundas, who dined with us, set us all agog with the news that 

the Ministry are to resign at once, probably have now resigned ; 

certainly much the wisest course for themselves, and John rather 

' Mr. Froude, in a talk with an Irish peasant on the grievances of his 
country, remarked that one cause of complaint was removed by Disestab- 
lishment of the Church. " Och, sure, your honour, that is worse than alL 
It was the best gravance we had, and ye've taken it away from us ! " 



2i8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

thinks the best for everybody. . . . How different this change of 
Ministry is to us from any there has been before since we were 
married, and for John since long before ! There is now only a 
keen and wholesome interest for the country's sake — none of the 
countless agitations which at all events on the formation of the 
three last Ministries, of which John was either the head or a 
prominent member, more than overpowered satisfaction and 
pride, perhaps not to himself, but to his wife in her secret heart. 
As to pride, I never was prouder of him in one position than in 
another, in than out, applauded than condemned ; and I had 
learned to know the risks, not to health only or chiefly, for that, 
precious as it was, seemed a trifle in comparison with other 
things, but to the power of serving his country, to friendship, to 
reputation in the highest sense, which are involved in the forma- 
tion of a Government. These are matters of experience, and in 
1846 I was inexperienced and consequently foresaw only good 
to the country and increase of fame to him from his accept- 
ance of the Prime Ministership. I now know that these seldom 
or never in such a state of parties as has existed for many years 
and still exists, can be the only consequences of high office for 
him, although, thank God, they have always been among the 
consequences, and my only reasonable and permanent regret (for 
I don't pretend to the absence of passing and unreasonable 
regrets) is for the catise of office being over for him. What a 
letter full of John, and just when I ought to be talking of every- 
body else except John ; but you will guess that if he were not 
perfectly cheerful — and he is more, he is full of patriotic eagerness 
— I could not write all this. . . . Thanks for your sympathy about 
Johnny — we were very sorry, I need not say.^ ... I don't at all 
mind the beating, which has been a glorious one in every way, 
but I immensely mind his not being in Parliament. . . . 

Your most affectionate sister, F. R. 

Mr. Charles Dickens to Lady Russell 
Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent 

Saturday, December 26, 1868 
My dear Lady Russell, — ... I cannot tell you how highly 
I esteem your kind Christmas remembrances, or how earnestly 
I send all seasonable wishes to you and Lord Russell and all who 
are dearest to you. I am unselfishly glad that Lord Russell is out 
of the turmoil and worry of a new Administration, but I miss him 
from it sorely. I was saying only yesterday to Layard (who is stay- 
ing here), that I could not get over the absence of that great Liberal 
name from a Liberal Government, and that I lost heart without it. 

Ever faithfully yours, 

Charles Dickens 
' Lord Amberley was defeated in the General Election. 



1866-70] IRISH DISESTABLISHMENT 219 

Lady Russell to Lady Victoria Villi ers 

Pembroke Lodge, February 4, 1869 

We have had such a gay time of it — that is, from Saturday to 
Monday only ; but we have had such a quiet hfe in general that 
that seems a great deal. The Gladstones with daughter Mary to 
dine. Gladstone was unanimously pronounced to be most agree- 
able and delightful. I never saw him in such high spirits, and he 
was as ready to talk about anything and everything, small and 
great, as if he had no Ministerial weight on his shoulders. He 
carries such fire and eloquence into whatever he talks about 
that it seems for the moment the most important subject in 
the world. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

37 Chesham Place, March 2, 1869 

London is extremely agreeable now, not rackety, but sociable 
— at least to the like of us who do not attempt to mix in the very 
gay world. . . . 

Arthur Russell called last night after hearing Gladstone's great 
speech [on Irish Disestablishment], well pleased himself and expect- 
ing the country to be so — the country, Ireland, more especially. 
On the whole your father is satisfied, but not with the whole ; he 
does not approve of the churches being left to the Protestants 
for ever, as there is nothing granted to the Roman Catholics. 
Neither does he like the appropriation of national money to 
charities.^ 

Lord Russell had followed up his first letter to Mr. 
Chichester Fortescue by two more letters, in which he again 
advocated both the disestablishment and disendowment of the 
Irish Church. He warmly supported Gladstone's measure ; 
though he again insisted that the funds of the Irish Church 
should be used to endow the other Churches. He was in 
constant attendance at the House of Lords, and during the 
same session he proposed, without success, a measure which 
would have added a limited number of life peers to the Second 
Chamber. These incursions into politics seem in no way 
to have taxed his strength. 

' The Bill transferred to the new disestablished Episcopal Church all 
the churches, all endowments given since 1660, while the remaining funds 
were to be handed over to the Government for the relief of poverty and 
suffering. 



220 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

Lady Russell to Mr. William Russell 

June 3, 1869 
It is a great misfortune that we have so few really eminent 
men among the clergy of England, Scotland, or Ireland — in any 
of the various communities. Such men are greatly needed to take 
the lead in what I cannot but look upon as a noble march of the 
progress of mankind, the assertion of the right to think and speak 
with unbounded freedom on that which concerns us all more 
deeply than anything else —religion. I believe that by the 
exercise of such unbounded freedom we shall reach to a know- 
ledge of God and a comprehension of the all-perfect spirit of 
Christianity such as no Established Church has ever taught by 
Creeds or Articles, though individuals of all such Churches have 
forgotten Creeds and Articles, and taught " true religion and 
undefiled " out of the real Word of God and their own high and 
holy thoughts. 

Pembroke Lodge, August 18, 1869 

My dear husband seventy-seven this day. God be thanked for 
all that has made it a calm and bright and blessed one to us. 

Our happiness now is chiefly in the past and present as to this 
world, in memory more than hope. But the best joys of the past 
and present are linked to that future beyond the grave to which 
we are hastening. . . . Bright and beautiful day. We sat long 
together in bowling-green and talked of the stir in men's minds 
on Christianity, on all religions and religion, our own thoughts, 
our hope, our trust. 

Lord Russell to Lady Georgiana Peel 

Pembroke Lodge, Richmond Park, August 18, 1869 
My dearest Georgy, — . . . Your very kind and warm con- 
gratulations delight me. It is sad that the years pass and make 
one older and weaker and sillier, but as they will pass all the 
same, it is well to have one bright day in each year when one's 
children can recall all the past, and feel once again gratitude to 
the Giver of all good. 

Your affectionate Father, 

Russell 
To Mr. Archibald Peel 

My dear Archie, — Thanks for your good wishes. Happy 
returns I always find them, as my children are so affectionate and 
loving — many I cannot expect — but I have played my part, and 
think the rest will be far easier than my task has been. 

Your affectionate F.I.L. (Father-in- Law) 

Russell 



i866-7o] SAN REMO 221 

On October 26th they left home for Italy, travelling across 
France in deep snow. They reached the Villa Garbarino, 
at San Remo, on November 3rd, and remained there till 
April, 1870. "The five months," Lady Russell writes, "were 
among the very happiest of our lives, and we reckon it among 
the three earthly paradises to which our wanderings have 
taken us — La Roche, St. Fillans, and San Remo. It was a 
very quiet life, but with a pleasant amount of society, many 
people we much liked passing through, or staying awhile, or, 
like ourselves, all the winter." 

They also became friendly with several of the Italians of 
San Remo, whom they welcomed at little evening gatherings 
at their villa. Their landlord, the Marchese Garbarino, was 
an ardent patriot. He it was who had decorated the ceiling 
of his drawing-room with the four portraits : Cavour, Garibaldi, 
Mazzini, and Lord John Russell, so it was to him a delightful 
surprise to have Lord John as his tenant. 

Lord Russell to Lady Minto 

San Remo, November 23, 1869 
I am very sorry that headache and neuralgia should have been 
added to illness and dislike of writing, as your reason for not 
inquiring how we were going on. We sit here in the receipt 
of news without any means of reciprocity, but we can speculate 
on France, Italy, and Ireland. Of those, the country which most 
interests and most concerns me, is Ireland. ... I have heard 
much of Lady and Lord Byron, and from good sources. I can 
only conclude that he was half mad and loved to frighten her, and 
that she believed in the stories she circulated. ^ The Duke of 
Wellington said of George IV's story that he was at the Battle of 
Waterloo, " At first it was a lie, than a strong delusion, and at last 
downright madness." 

Brougham's conversation with William IV on the dissolution 
was another delusion, and so on in perverse, wicked, contradictory 
human nature. Those who like to probe such systems may do so 
— the only wise conclusion is Swift's, " If you want to confute a 
lie, tell another in the opposite direction." Madame de Sevigne 
tells of a curate who put up a clock on his church. His parishioners 

^ The publication of " Astarte," by the late Lord Lovelace, containing 
the documents and letters relating to Byron's separation from his wife, has 
now made it quite clear that the grounds for separation were real. 



222 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

collected stones to break it, saying it was the Gabelle. " No, my 
friends," he said, " it was the Jubilee," on which they all hurrahed 
and went away. If he had said it was a machine to mark the hour, 
his clock would have been broken and himself pelted. 

I hope your second volume is coming out soon. ^ There are no 
lies in it, and therefore you must not expect a great sale. I must 
stop or you will think me grown a misanthrope. Fanny and 
Agatha are well. If the day had been fine the Crown Princess 
and her sister would have come here to tea, and you would have 
had no letter from me. Do send me a return, when your mankind 
is gone a-hunting. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

San Remo, December i, 1869 
Your letter of November 24th found the Amberleys here. . . . 
They were preceded by the Crown Princess of Prussia and 
Princess Louis of Hesse, announced by telegram in the morning, 
and a young Prince Albert of Prussia, son of the Prince Albert 
of our Berlin days, and a suite of two gentlemen and a lady, 
who came from Cannes, where they are living, on Friday, 
to pay us a visit, dined with us, slept at the nearest hotel, and were 
off again Saturday morning, we going with them as far as Bordi- 
ghera ; and on Monday arrived the Odos ^ for one night only, 
sleeping at an hotel. You see that our usual quiet life was for 

a while exchanged for one of . . . Well, I beg pardon for this 

interruption and go back to our illustrious and non-illustrious 
visitors. The illustrious were as merry as if they had no royalty 
about them, and as simple, too, dining in their travelling garments, 
brushing and washing in my room and John's, enjoying their 
dinner, of which happily there was enough (although the suite 
was unexpected owing to my not having received a letter giving 
details), chatting and laughing afterwards till half -past eight, 
when they walked in darkness, and strange to say, mud ! but 
with glorious stars overhead, the hve minutes' distance to their 
hotel, accompanied by Agatha and me. The drive to Bordighera 
next morning was the pleasantest part of the visit to us all — 
John, Princess Louis, and Prince Albert in their carriage, Crown 
Princess, Agatha, and I in ours. It is wonderful to hear Princesses 
express such widely liberal opinions and feelings on education, 
religion, nationality, and if we had talked politics I dare-say I 
should add that too. Their strong love for their Vaterland in spite 
of their early transplantation is also very agreeable. 

The Amberleys had been ten days with Mill at Avignon — a 

' The second volume of " Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Elliot, First 
Earl of Minto." 

" Mr. Odo Russell (afterwards Lord Ampthill) and his wife. 



I866-70] INTRODUCTION TO SPEECHES 223 

good fortification, I should imagine, against the wiles and blandish- 
ments of priests of all degree to which they will be exposed at 
Rome. . . . Little Rachel ^ is as sweet a little bright-eyed lassie as 
I ever saw, hardly saying anything yet, but expressing a vast deal. 

Lord Russell to Colonel Romilly 

San Remo, December 4, 1869 
My dear Frederick, — I had understood from you that you 
wished to propose some alterations in my Introduction to the 
Speeches, and I was much obliged to you for so kind a thought. 
But it appears by a letter from Lizzy that she and you think that 
all discussions of the future (which are announced in my preface) 
ought to be omitted. In logical and literary aspects you are quite 
right ; but I must tell you that since 1832 Ireland has been a main 
object of all my political career. ... I am not without hope 
that the House of Commons will pass a reasonable Land Bill, 
and adhere to the plan of national education, which has been 
in force now for nearly forty years. At all events, the present 
government of Ireland gives no proofs of the infallibility of 
our rulers. Tell Lizzy that it is not a plate of salted cherries, 
but cherries ripe, without any salt, which I propose to lay before 
the Irish. 

Yours affectionately, 

Russell 

In the closing passage of the " Introduction " referred to 
in the above letter Lord Russell gives a modest estimate of 
his own career : " My capacity I always felt was very inferior 
to that of the men who have attained in past times the 
foremost place in our Parliament, and in the Councils of our 
Sovereign. I have committed many errors, some of them 
very gross blunders. B'it the generous people of England 
are always forbearing and forgiving to those statesmen who 
have the good of their country at heart; like my betters, I 
have been misrepresented and slandered by those who knew 
nothing of me, but I have been more than compensated by 
the confidence and the friendship of the best men of my own 
political connection, and by the regard and favourable in- 
terpretation of my motives which I have heard expressed by 
my generous opponents, from the days of Lord Castlereagh 
to those of Mr. Disraeli." 

' Daughter of Lord and Lady Amberley, born in February, 1868. 



224 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

San Remo, February 17, 1870 

How awful Paris will be after the easy, natural, unconventional 
life of San Remo, one delight of which is the absence of all thought 
about dress ! Whatever may be and are the delights of Paris — and 
I fully intend that we should all three enjoy them — that burden is 
heavier there than in all the world beside — and why ? oh, why ? 
What is there to prevent human nature from finding out and 
rejoicing in the blessings of civilization and society without encum- 
bering them with petty etiquettes and fashions and forms which 
deprive them of half their value ? Human nature is a very pro- 
voking compound. It strives and struggles and gives life itself for 
political freedom, while it forges social chains and fetters for itself 
and wears them with a foolish smile. And with this fruitless 
lamentation I must end. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

San Remo, February 23, 1870 

I don't know a bit whether we shall be much in London during 
the session — it will be session, not season, that takes us there. . . . 
The longer I live the more I condemn and deplore a rackety life 
for any girl, and therefore if I do what I myself think right by her 
and not what others may think right, she shall never be a London 
butterfly. Would that we could give our girls the ideal society 
which I suppose we all dream for them — that of the wise and the 
good of all ages, of the young and merry of their own. No bar- 
barous crowds, no despotic fashions, no senseless omnipotence of 
custom (see " Childe Harold," somewhere).^ I wonder in this age 
of revolution, which has dethroned so many monarchs and upset 
so many time-honoured systems of Government and broken so 
many chains, that Queen Fashion is left unmolested on her throne, 
ruling the civilized world with her rod of iron, and binding us 
hand and foot in her fetters. 

' A favourite stanza of Lady Russell's in " Childe Harold " : — 

What from this barren being do we reap ? 
Our senses narrow, and our reason frail, 
Life short, and truth a gem which loves the deep. 
And all things weighed in custom's falsest scale ; 
Opinion an omnipotence, whose veil 
Mantles the earth with darkness, until right 
And wrong are accidents, and men grow pale 
Lest their own judgments should become too bright. 
And their free thoughts be crimes, and earth have too much light. 

Byron. 



I866-70] SAN REMO 225 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

San Remo, March 2, 1870 
I am writing in my pretty bedroom, at an east window which 
is wide open, letting in the balmiest of airs, and the spring twit- 
tering of chaffinches and larks and other little birds, and the gentle 
music of the waves. Below the window I look at a very untidy 
bit of nondescript ground, with a few white-armed fig-trees and a 
number of flaunting Italian daisies — a little farther an enclosure of 
glossy green orange-trees laden with fruit ; then an olive plantation, 
soft and feathery ; then a bare, brownish, pleasant hill, crowned 
by the '^ Madonna della Guardia," and stretching to the sea, which 
Ii should like to call blue, but which is a dull grey. Oh dear, how 
sorry we shall be to leave it all ! You, I know, understand the sort 
of shrinking there is after so quiet, so spoiling, so natural and un- 
conventional a life (not to mention climate and beauty) from the 
thought of the overpowering quantity of people and business of 
all sorts and the artificial habits of our own country, in spite of 
the immense pleasure of looking forward to brothers and sisters 
and children and friends. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

San Remo, March 17, 1870 
. . . No doubt we must always in the last resort trust to our own 
reason upon all subjects on which our reason is capable of helping 
us. On a question of language, Hebrew for instance, if we don't 
know it and somebody else does, we cannot of course dispute his 
translation, but where nobody questions the words, everybody has 
a right — it is indeed everybody's duty — to reflect upon their meaning 
and bearing and come to their own conclusions ; listening to 
others wiser or not wiser than themselves, eagerly seeking help, 
but never, oh never fettering their minds by an unconditional 
and premeditated submission to anybody else's, or rather pre- 
tending so to fetter it, for a mind will make itself heard, and there's 
much false modesty in the disclaimer of all power or right to judge 
— that very disclaimer being in fact, as you say, an exercise of 
private judgment and a rebellion or protest against thousands of 
wise and good and learned men. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

San Remo, March 23, 1870 
You must take John's second letter to Forster,^ which will 
appear in the Times and Daily News, as my letter to you for to-day, 

^, ' In February Mr. Forster introduced the Elementary Education Act. 
It passed the second reading without a division. In Committee the 
Cowper-Temple Clause was admitted by the Government. 

Q 



226 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1866-70 

as I had already not left myself much time for you, so that 
copying them, although they are not long, has left me hardly any. 
I think you will agree with him that now, when the moment seems 
come for a really national system of education, it would be a great 
pity not to put an end to the teaching of catechisms in rate- 
supported schools. People may of course always have their little 
pet, privately supported sectarian schools, but surely, surely, it's 
enough that the weary catechism should be repeated and yawned 
over every Sunday of the year, where there are Sunday schools. I 
wonder whether you are in favour of compulsory attendance. I 
don't like it, but I do like compulsory rating, and I wish the Bill 
made it general and not local, and I also want the education to be 
gratis. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

San Remo, April 6, 1870 

We go on discussing the Education Bill and all that is written 
about it with immense interest, but oh, the clergy ! they seem 
resolved to fulfil the prophecy that Christ came not to bring peace 
on earth, but a sword. . . . How true what you say of want of 
earnestness in London society and Parliament ! 

On April 7th they left San Remo, " servants ^ all in tears," 
she writes, " and all, high and low, showering blessings on us, 
and praying for our welfare in their lovely language." At 
Paris they stayed with Lord Lyons at the British Embassy. 
The Emperor Napoleon and Empress Eugenie showed them 
much kindness during their visit to Paris. One evening Lord 
and Lady Russell and their daughter dined at the Tuileries, 
Lady Russell sitting next the Emperor and Lord Russell next 
the Empress. It has been told since that at this dinner the 
Emperor mentioned a riddle which he had put to the 
Empress, and her reply. 

Emperor. Quelle est la difference entre toi et un miroir ? 

Empress. Je ne sais pas. 

Emperor. Le miroir reflechit ; tu ne reflechis pas. 

Empress. Et quelle est la difference entre toi et un miroir ? 

Emperor. Je ne sais pas. 

Empress. Le miroir est poli, et tu ne I'es pas. 

On April 27th, after six months' absence, Lord and Lady 
Russell were once more at Pembroke Lodge. 
' Their Italian servants. 



1866-70] RETURN TO ENGLAND 227 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

37 Chesham Place, May 26, 1870 

. . . We came up, your father and I, on Tuesday to dine with 
Clarendons, and stayed all yesterday to dine with Salisburys. 
Many things strike me on returning to England and English 
society : the superiority of its best to those of any other nation ; 
the larger proportion of vulgarity in all classes ; ostentatious vul- 
garity, aristocratic vulgarity, coarse vulgarity ; the stir and activity 
of mind on religion, politics, morals, all that is most worthy of 
thought. What is to come of it all? Will goodness and truth 
prevail ? Is a great regeneration coming ? I believe it in spite of 
many discouraging symptoms. I believe that a coming generation 
will try to be and not only call itself Christian. God grant that 
each of my children may add some little ray of light by thought, 
word, and deed to help in dispelling the darkness of error, sin, and 
crime in this and all other lands. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

June 2, 1870 

I wish most earnestly for legal and social equality for women, 
but I cannot shut my eyes to what woman has already been — the 
equal, if not the superior, of man in all that is highest and noblest 
and loveliest. I don't at all approve of any appearance of setting 
one against the other. Let equal justice be done to both, without 
any spirit of antagonism. ... I can well believe in all the delights 
of Oxford, and envy men that portion of their life. 



CHAPTER XII 
1870-78 

IN July, 1870, public attention was abruptly distracted from 
Irish and educational questions by the outbreak of 
the Franco-German War, which followed immediately upon 
the King of Prussia's refusal to promise France that he would 
never, under any circumstances, countenance his cousin Prince 
Leopold's candidature for the Spanish throne. War came as a 
surprise to every one, even to the Foreign Office, and its real 
causes were little understood at the time. The entire blame 
fell on Napoleon. Only some, who had special information, 
knew that Bismarck had long been waiting for the opportunity 
which the extravagant demand of France had just given him ; 
and very few among the well-informed guessed that he might 
have had a hand in contriving the cause of dispute itself. 
Napoleon, since his annexation of Savoy, had so bad a reputa- 
tion in Europe, a reputation which Bismarck had managed to 
blacken still more in their recent controversy over Luxem- 
bourg, that people were ready to take it as a matter of course 
that Napoleon should be the aggressor. Finally, by publish- 
ing through the Times the secret document in M. Benedetti's 
own hand, which assured help to Germany in annexing 
Holland, if Germany would help Napoleon to seize Belgium, 
Bismarck destroyed all remaining sympathy for France. 

Now, however, that the inner history of events has come 
to light, we know that it was Germany who fomented the 
quarrel, though both Austria and France must be held 
responsible for the conditions which made the policy of 
Germany possible. The significant suppression of the part of 



1870-78] FRANCO-GERMAN WAR 229 

Bernhardi's memoirs dealing with his secret mission from 
Bismarck to Spain, and the fact that a large sum of Prussian 
money is now known to have passed to Spain, ^ while the 
Cortes was discussing the question of succession, make it 
probable that Bismarck not only took advantage of French 
hostility to Prince Leopold's candidature, but deliberately 
instigated the offer of the Spanish throne to a German prince, 
because he knew France was certain to resent it. 

Napoleon, however, must be held responsible, inasmuch 
as since the close of the Seven Weeks' War, he had intrigued 
with Austria to induce her to revenge herself by a joint attack 
with him upon Germany, hoping that he might win with 
Austria's help those concessions of territory along the Rhine, 
which Bismarck had peremptorily refused him as a pour-boire 
after Sadowa. Austria, too, must take a share of the responsi- 
bility, since through the secret negotiations of the Archduke 
Albrecht she had encouraged Napoleon in this idea. Both 
Napoleon and the Archduke were convinced that those South- 
German States which had been annexed by Prussia for siding 
with Austria would rise, if their attack on Prussia could be 
associated with the idea of liberation. Bismarck's cleverness 
in picking the quarrel over the question of the Spanish succes- 
sion, a matter which did not in the least concern South- 
Germany, proved fatal to their expectations. This triumph of 
diplomacy, together with the success of his master-stroke of 
provocation, the Ems telegram, decided the fate of France. 
As edited by Bismarck, the King of Prussia's telegram describ- 
ing his last interview with the French Ambassador at Ems, 
infuriated the French to the necessary pitch of recklessness, 
while to Germans it read like the account of an insult to 
German-speaking peoples, and tended to draw them together 
in resentment. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Saltburn, August 24, 1870 

Don't you sometimes feel that a few weeks' delay in beginning 
this horrible war might have given time to Europe to discover 

' Lord Acton, " Historical Essays and Studies." 



230 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

some better means than war for settling the dispute ? We are full 
of schemes for the prevention of future wars. The only com- 
pensation I see for all these horrors is the conviction they bring of 
the amount of heroism in the world and of the progress made in 
humanity towards enemies — especially sick and wounded. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Saltburn, August 30, 1870 
Poor Paris ! You may well say we must be sorry for it, having 
so lately seen it in all its gay spring beauty — and though no doubt 
the surface, which is all we saw of its inhabitants, is better than 
the groundwork, how much of good and great it contains ! How 
the best Frenchmen everywhere, and the best Parisians in particu- 
lar, must grieve over the deep corruption which has done much to 
bring their country to its present dreary prospects. I did not 
mean that any mediation or interference of other Powers would 
have prevented this war, but that there ought by this time to be 
a substitute found for all war. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Saltburn, September 7, 1870 
Don't you find it bewildering to be hurried at express speed 
through such mighty pages of history ? And if bewildering and 
overpowering to us, who from the beginning of the war could 
see a probability of French disaster, what must it be to Paris, to 
all France, fed with falsehood as they have been till from one 
success to another they find their Emperor and an army of 
80,000 men prisoners of war ! But what a people ! Who 
would have supposed by reading the accounts of Paris on 
Sunday, the excess of joy, the air de fete, the wild exultation, 
that an immense calamity, a bitter mortification had just befallen 
the country ! that a gigantic German army was on its way to their 
gates ! I should like to know whether many of those who shouted 
" Vive I'Empereur " when he left Paris, who applauded the war 
and hooted down anybody who doubted its justice or attacked 
Imperialism, are now among the shouters of "Vive la Repub- 
lique" and the new Democratic Ministry. Let us hope not. 
Let us hope a great many things from the downfall of a corrupt 
Court, and the call for heroism and self-sacrifice to a frivolous 
and depraved city — frivolous and depraved, and yet containing 
so much of noble and good — all the nobler and better, perhaps, 
from the constant struggle to remain so in that atmosphere. 
Even if, as God grant, there is no siege, the serious thoughts 
which the prospect of it must give will perhaps not be lost on 
the Parisians. I, like you, long that the King of Prussia may 



1870-78] FRANCO-GERMAN WAR 231 

prove that he spoke in all sincerity when he said that he fought 
against the Emperor, not France, and be magnanimous in the 
conditions he may offer — but what does that precisely mean ? 
John says he is right to seek for some guarantee against future 
French ambition. Hitherto he has acted very like a gentleman, 
as John in the House of Lords declared him to be, and may still 
be your model sovereign. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, November 3, 1870 
Your letter is so interesting and raises so many serious 
thoughts that I should like to answer it as it deserves, but 
can't do so to-day as I am obliged to go to London on busi- 
ness, and have hardly a moment. The kind of *' gigantic brains " 
which you mention are, I agree with you, often repulsive — there 
is a harshness of dissent from all that mankind most values, all 
that has raised them above this earth, which cannot be right — 
which is the result of deficiency in some part of their minds 
or hearts or both, and not of excess of intellect or any other 
good thing. If they are right in their contempt of Christian 
faith and hope, or of all other spiritual faith and hope, they 
ought to be " of all men most miserable " ; but they are apt to 
reject Christian charity too, and to dance on the ruins of all 
that has hitherto sustained their fellow-creatures in a world of 
sin and sorrow. That they are not right, but wofully wrong, 
I firmly believe, and happily many and many a noble intellect 
and great heart, which have not shrunk from searching into the 
mysteries of life and death with all the powers and all the love of 
truth given them by God to be used, not to lie dormant or merely 
receive what other men teach, have risen from the search with a 
firmer faith than before in Christ and in the immortahty which he 
brought to light. I believe that many of those who deem them- 
selves sceptics or atheists retain, after all, enough of the divine 
element within them practically to refute their own words. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, Januaty 4, 1871 
I wonder whether the solemn thoughts which must belong to 
the end of a year, and the solemn services by which it has been 
celebrated both by Germans and French, will lead them to ask 
themselves in all earnestness whether it is really duty, really what 
they believe to be God's will, which guides them in the con- 
tinuance of a fearful war — whether earthly passions, earthly point 
of honour, do not mingle with their determination. If they do 
ask themselves such questions, what will be the answers ? I, too, 



232 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

am often tempted to wish peace at any price, yet neither you 
nor I would act upon the wish were we the people to act. It 
was the peace at any price doctrine that forced us into the 
Russian war. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, January 25, 1871 

Hopes of peace at last, thank God ! I can think of little 
else — the increasing and accumulating horrors, miseries, and 
desolation of this wicked war have been enough to make one 
despair of mankind. France alone was in the wrong at first, but 
both have been wrong ever since Sedan, so at least I think, but 
it is too long a matter to discuss in a letter. If the new Emperor^ 
does not grant most honourable terms to Paris, I shall give him 
up altogether as a self-seeking, hard-hearted old man of fire and 
sword. I dare say you have not heard as many sad stories as we 
have of the losses and disasters and unspeakable sorrows of 
people in Paris, known to other people we have seen. I won't 
repeat any of them, as it can do no good. I am glad to know 
that the Crown Prince hates the war, hates the bombardment, and 
opposed it strongly, and then again opposed sending shells into 
the town, and v/as very angry when it began to be done. 
Indeed, everything that we hear of him is highly to his credit, 
and one may hope much for the welfare and good government 
of United Germany from him and his wife. 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, January 26, 1871 

. . . We are rejoicing and thanking God for the blessed news 
of the coming surrender of Paris. Alas for all the wasted lives — 
wasted, / think, on both sides, for I cannot perceive that it 
was on either side one of those great and holy causes in which 
the blood shed by one generation bears fruit for the next. The 
Times was too quick in drawing conclusions from Jules Favre 
being at Versailles, but there can be little doubt that terms are 
under consideration, and I hope the Germans will show that 
they are not so spoiled by success as to be ungenerous in their 
demands. As to Alsace and Lorraine, I fear that it is a settled 
point with them. If so, they ought to be all the more ready to 
grant terms honourable in other respects. Do you see that a 
brave man in the Berlin Parliament raised his voice against 
annexation of French provinces, on the discussion of address to 
the new Emperor on his new dignity ? . . . What wonderfully 
interesting lectures Tyndall is giving. 

' King William of Prussia had just taken the title of German Emperor. 



1870-78] SWITZERLAND 233 

London, J^uly 12, 1871 

We lunched yesterday, all three, with Bernstorffs,'' to meet 
Crown Prince and Princess — best of Princes and Princesses. It 
was interesting and agreeable. John and I had the luck to sit 
beside her and him. I was delighted to hear him say, " I hate 
war," with an emphasis better than words. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, J^uly 2y, 1871 
... I suppose Agatha told you of the Emperor of Brazil's visit 
to us at 7 a.m. — it was amusing to get up at six to receive an 
Emperor, impossible to put on much ceremony with one's 
garments at that unceremonious hour, and fortunately unnecessary, 
for His Majesty was chatty and easy. He took a turn along West 
walk, admired the view, had a cup of chocolate, thanked us for 
our courtesy, and was off again before eight with his sallow-faced, 
grimy gentleman in waiting, who looked as if the little sleep he 
ever had was with his clothes on. We tried to see another 
Emperor ^ on Tuesday, having at last made out our journey to 
Chislehurst. Unluckily he and his son had gone to town, but we 
found the Empress. How unlike the splendid, bejewelled, pomp- 
and-gloryfied Empress of the Tuileries : her dress careless and 
common, her face little, if at all, painted, and thereby to my eye 
improved — but so altered. She seemed, however, in good spirits. 
She did not talk of France, but feared for England anything 
tending to diminish authority of "powers that be." 

On August 18, 1 87 1, Lord Russell's seventy-ninth birthday 
was celebrated at Pembroke Lodge by the school children 
under the cedar in the garden. " His serene and cheerful 
mind, a greater blessing year by year as enjoyments one by 
one drop away. He looks back with gratitude, he accepts the 
present with contentment. He looks forward, I think, without 
dread." In September they went abroad, and took for the 
second time the house at Renens-sur-Roche, in Switzerland, 
where they had stayed in 1855. Lady Russell's mind was 
still full of horror of the recent war. 

The first morning at Glyon (she writes to her sister. Lady 
Dunfermline) was one of merciless rain, but the afternoon did well 
enough for Chillon, to which use we all put it, and very interest- 

' Count Bernstorff was German Ambassador in London. 

' Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie were living at Chislehurst. 



234 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

ing, grimly and horribly so, we found it. Men are less wicked and 
less cruel, tyrants are less tyrannical nowadays than when so-called 
criminals, often the best men in their country, were chained by 
iron rings to dungeon stones for years and years, or fastened to 
pillars and tortured by slow fires, or thrown down " oubliettes " 
into the lake below, falling first on a revolving machine stuck full 
of sharp blades — of all which horrors we were shown the scene 
and the remains. But I hope that some centuries hence travellers 
will wonder at even the present use to which Chillon is put, that 
of an arsenal, and thank God that they did not live in an age when 
sovereigns and rulers could command man to destroy his brother- 
man. 

From Switzerland they moved down to the South of France 
to get to a warmer climate. They had taken a villa for the 
winter at Cannes, where they had a happy time, brightened 
during the Christmas vacation by the visits of their sons with 
friends from Oxford. In his old age Lord Russell seemed to 
enjoy more and more the companionship of the youngs and 
entered with spirit into their merry jests and their eager con- 
versations on great subjects, discussed with the freshness and 
enthusiasm of youth. 

Lord Russell, as the following letters show, was still taking 
keen interest in education questions : 

Lord Russell to Colonel Romilly 

Renens, September 27, 1871 
I see the Bishop of Manchester has been speaking in favour of 
" a very moderate form of dogmatism " to be imposed on Dis- 
senters who wish their children to have religious teaching. I am 
quite against this moderate form, which consists in making a 
Baptist child own that he is to believe what his godfathers and 
godmothers promised for him — he having neither godfathers nor 
godmothers. Every form of persecution is in my eyes detestable, 
so that I shall have^to fight a new fight for freedom of education. 

Lord Rus<iell to Lady Minto 

Cannes, January 6, 1872 
My dearest Nina, — Your New Year's Day letter shows that 
you write as well as a volunteer as on compulsion. ... I am sorry 
to have annoyed Maggie by my allusion to the Hertfordshire 
incumbent. Here is my case. Sixty-three years ago my father, 
with others founded a Society to teach the Bible to young boys 



1870-78] CANNES 235 

and girls, which they called " Schools for all." One should have 
thought there was no harm in the project, and that they might 
have been left alone. Not so. The clergy were furious. Sixty 
years ago they founded the National Society, and ever since they 
have libelled our schools. . . . Last year or the year before the 
H.I. [Hertfordshire Incumbent] attacked my proposals. I left 
him alone, but I carried the day, and excluded formularies from 
schools provided by rates. Still the bishops and clergy fulminate 
against us, shut out Baptists from the schools where they have 
influence, and declaim against us. Now I happen to have a great 
respect for the Bible, and while I have life will not cease to 
defend our Bible schools. You will say, if I do not, that in time 
the world will come round to Christianity, which is at a low ebb 
at present. Men will understand at last that they ought to love 
God and to love their neighbour as themselves, not to steal, or 
commit murder, or cheat their neighbours. The Athanasian Creed 
is making a pretty hubbub. It was invented as a substitute for 
Christianity, and taken from Aristotle. . . . 

Ever yours affectionately, 

Russell 
Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Cannes, November 29, 1871 
What is to be the result of the Republican ferment in our 
country ? It may not be widespread, and it certainly hardly 
exists above the working classes, yet I feel that the germ is there 
— and who can say how far it is doomed to flourish, or whether it 
will die away. . . . Ours has been so free and independent and 
prosperous a nation, that the notion of any fundamental change in 
the Constitution is awful. Yet when we boast of our freedom and 
prosperity we should not forget the enormous mass of misery, 
vice, filth, and all evil which disgraces all our large towns — nor 
the brutish ignorance and apathy which pervades much of our 
rural population. And it is well worth the most earnest thought 
and study, on the part of all Englishmen and women, to find out 
whether our form of government has or has not any share of the 
blame and to act accordingly. I have great confidence in the 
British people. They have never liked hasty, ill-considered 
changes j they hate revolution ; and I hope I am not too trustful in 
believing that we shall go on in the wise and the right path, what- 
ever that may be, and in spite of the freaks and follies of many 
a man whose aims are more selfish than patriotic. 

While at Cannes Lord and Lady Russell saw a great deal 
of Princess Christian, who was living near them, and was in 
great anxiety and sorrow about the illness of her brother, the 
Prince of Wales, who nearly died in December, 1871. His 



236 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

illness was the occasion of a display of loyalty and sympathy 

from thousands of British subjects. Lady Russell received 

the following reply to a letter she wrote from Cannes to the 

Queen : 

Queen Victoria to Lady Russell 

Osborne, January 22, 1872 
Dear Lady Russell, — I meant ere this to have thanked you 
for your very kind letter of the ist, but my dear son's illness 
brought with it much writing besides much to do, in addition to 
which, there is the correspondence with four absent married 
daughters, which is no light task. I thank you now both most 
warmly for the great kindness of your expressions about my own 
long and severe illness, when you so kindly wrote to Lady Ely to 
inquire, and relative to this last dreadful illness of my dear son's, 
coming, as it did, when I was far from strong myself. Thank 
God ! I was able to be near him and with my beloved daughter, 
the Princess of Wales (who behaved so beautifully and admirably), 
during that terrible time, when for nearly a week his life hung on 
a thread. Indeed, for a whole month at least, if not for five weeks, 
his state was one of the greatest anxiety and indeed of danger. 
Since the 4th we may look on his progress as steady and good, 
and I hear that he was able to drive out yesterday for a little while. 
But great quiet will be necessary for a long while to come. You 
are very kind in your accounts of Helena, who no doubt must 
have suffered much from being so far off. ... I hear that she 
is really better and stronger. She speaks often of the pleasure it 
is to her to see you and Lord Russell, of whom I am delighted to 
hear so good an account. Though not very strong and not free 
from rheumatic pains at times, I am much better and able to 
walk again out of doors, much as usual. 

With kind remembrances to Lord Russell and Agatha, 

Ever yours affectionately, 
V. R. 

In the spring they all came back to England. Lord John 
had benefited in health by wintering abroad ; he was still 
vigorous enough to resist in the House of Lords the claim 
of the United States for the Alabama indemnity, and to give 
a presidential address to the Historical Society ; but the years 
were beginning to tell on him. 

Pembroke Lodge, April 18, 1872 

John did not venture out — still looks tired and not as he did 
when we arrived, but no cold. Sad, most sad to me, that when I 



1870-78] RICH AND POOR 237 

take a brisk turn in the garden, it is no longer with him — that his 
enjoyments, his active powers, yearly dwindle away — that it is 
scarcely possible he should not at times feel the hours too long 
from the difficulty of finding variety of occupation. Writing, 
walking, even reading very long or talking much with friends and 
visitors all tire him. He never complains, and I thank God for 
his patience, and oh ! so heartily that he has no pain, no chronic 
ailment. But alas for the days of his vigour when he was out and 
in twenty times a day, when life had a zest which nothing can 
restore ! 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, August 8, 1872 
Filled with wonder, shame, remorse, I begin on a Thursday to 
write to you. What possessed me to let Wednesday pass without 
doing so I can't tell, but I think it happens about once a year, and 
I dare say it's a statistical mystery — the averages must be kept 
right, and my mind is not to blame — no free will in the matter. 
This brings me to an essay in one of the magazines for August — I 
forget which — on the statistics of prayer. Not a nice name 
(perhaps it's not correct, but nearly so), and not a nice article, it 
seemed to me — but I only glanced at it ; produced, like many 
other faulty things of the kind, by illogical superstition on the part 
of Christian clergy, most of whom preach a half-belief, some a 
whole belief, on the efficacy of prayer for temporal good. Then 
comes the hard unbeliever, delighted to prove, as any child can do, 
that such prayer cannot be proved to avail anything. He is in- 
capable of understanding the deeper and truer kind of prayer, but 
he convinces many that all communion with God is fruitless, or 
perhaps that there is no God with whom to hold it. This may 
not be the drift of the article, for, as I said, I have not read it, but 
it is the drift of much that is talked and written nowadays by men 
and women of the author's school. I wish there were no schools 
in that sense. They always have done and always will do harm, 
and prevent the independence of thought which they are by way of 
encouraging. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, Christmas Day, 1872 
I do indeed feel with you how wonderful the goodness and the 
contented spirit of many thousands of poor, pent-up, toiling human 
beings, who live in God's glorious world and leave it without ever 
knowing its glories, whose lives are one struggle to maintain life ; 
and I think with you how easy it ought to be for us who have 
leisure for the beauty of life, in nature and in books, in conversa- 
tion and in art. And yet, it was to the rich that Christ gave His 
most frequent warnings. Is it then, after all, easiest for the poor 
to do His will and love Him and trust Him in all things ? 



238 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

The summer and autumn and winter had been spent 
almost entirely at Pembroke Lodge, but when Parliament 
met early in 1873 they moved to London, where they had 
taken a house till Easter. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

London, February 19, 1873 
Scene — a drawing-room ; hour 11.30 a.m. A young lady play- 
ing the pianoforte by candle-light. An old lady writing, also by 
candle-light. An old gentleman five minutes ago sitting reading 
also by candle-light, but now doing the same in a room below. 
Three large windows through which is seen a vast expanse of a 
semi-substantial material of the hue of a smoked primrose ; against 
it is dimly visible an irregular and picturesque outline, probably of 
a range of mountains, some rocky and pyramidal, others horizontally 
banked. Altogether, a mystery replete with grandeur in the elfect 
— none of your Southern transparency leaving nothing for the 
imagination. Seriously, it's laughable that human beings should 
congregate so as to produce these effects, and that we among 
others should by preference be among the congregators. Your 
day at Napoule is like something in a different world altogether. 
You are rather hard, John says, and he is not disposed to be 
otherwise, on Parliamentary sayings and doings. I can say nothing 
from myself, as I have not read one single speech, except that I 
cannot bear the humiliating exclusion of any kind of useful know- 
ledge from a University out of false consideration for religious or 
irreligious scruples.* Surely young men had better be taught 
boldly to face the fact that men differ than be dealt with in this 
ridiculously tender and most futile manner. 

In August, 1873, after the publication of Lord Russell's 
book, " Essays on the History of the Christian Religion," they 
spent some six weeks at Dieppe, where Lord Russell's health 
again considerably improved. 

Mr. Disraeli to Lord Russell 

George Street, Hanover Square, May 8, 1873 
My dear Lord, — I have just finished reading your book, 
which I was much gratified by receiving from the author. ... I 
cannot refrain from expressing to you the great pleasure its perusal 

' The Irish University Bill was being discussed in the Commons, one 
clause of which proposed to exclude theology, philosophy, and history 
from the curriculum of the New University. 



1870-78] REVERENCE, FREE THOUGHT 239 

gave me. The subject is of perpetual interest, and it is treated, in 
many instances, with originaHty founded on truth, and with wonder- 
ful freshness. The remarks suggested by your own eminent career 
give to the general conduct of the theme additional interest, like 
the personal passages in Montaigne. I wish there had been more 
of them, or that you would favour the world with some observa- 
tions on men and things, which one who is alike a statesman, a 
philosopher, and a scholar could alone supply. In your retirement 
you have the inestimable happiness of constant and accomplished 
sympathy, without which life is little worth. Mine is lone and 
dark, but still, I hope I may send my kindest remembrances to 
Lady Russell. 

Yours with sincere respect and regard, 

B. Disraeli 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, July 3, 1873 
You will not be disappointed, I do believe, with John's book, 
high as your expectations are. The spirit of it at all events is that 
of your letter : that of love and reverence for what you truly call 
the wonder of wonders — the Bible — as well as that of perfect 
freedom of thought. Had that perfect freedom always been 
allowed to mankind by kings, rulers, and priests, in all their dis- 
guises, we should never have had the " trash " of which you 
complain inundating our country and thinking itself a substitute 
for the simple lessons and glorious promises of Christ. Whereas 
in proportion as it is less " trashy," it approaches more nearly, 
though unconsciously, to what He taught, borrowing what is best in 
it from Him, only giving an earthly tone to what He made divine. 
I have, perhaps, more indulgence than you for some of the anti- 
Christian thinkers and writers of the day — those who love truth 
with all their souls, who would give their lives to believe that — 

" Dust thou art, to dust returnest, 
Was not spoken of the soul," 

but who seek a kind of proof of this which never can be found. 
They are very unhappy in this world, but I believe they are nearer 
heaven than many comfortable so-called believers, and will find 
their happiness beyond that death upon which they look as anni- 
hilation. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, October 22, 1873 
Louisa * writes in such warm admiration of Minto indoors and 
out, it did me good to read it, and such joy in meeting you. Shall I 

' Lady Louisa Howard, formerly Lady Louisa Fitzmaurice (daughter of 
Lord Lansdowne), one of Lady Russell's earliest friends. 



240 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

ever be there again, I wonder ? — a foolish wonder, and foolisher 
still when let out ! Dear old oak-room — to me too Granny Brydone 
is always present there. I cannot think of it without her image 
rising before me. How perfect she was ! How far above the 
common world she and Mama, and yet both spending their lives 
in the discharge of common, and what many would call, petty 
duties ! How little it signifies what are the special duties to which 
we are called, how much the spirit in which we do them ! I 
don't think I ever longed so much for long talks day after day with 
you. Don't say such hopes are visionary, though, alas ! they have 
over and over again vanished before our eyes. 



Lady Russell to Lord Amherley 

Pembroke Lodge, October 28, 1873 

Dearest Johnny, — . . . Rollo bought Mill's autobiography, 
and I have read the greater part of it. Deeply interesting it is, 
and his lovableness comes out in it as much as his intellect— but 
deeply sad too, in more ways than one. I live in dread of the 
possible effect on you and Kate of the account of his education 
by his father — the principles right, the application so wofully 
wrong. Mill was a learned scholar, a great thinker, a good man, 
partly in consequence, partly in spite of it. . . . Happily you have 
more Popes than one, as good for you as it was for the world 
in days of old. Happily, too, there's such a thing as love, innate^ 
intuitive, instinctive (oh, horrible !), which is wise in proportion to 
its depth, and will be your best and safest guide. How strange 
Mill's utter silence about his mother ! How beautiful and touch- 
ing the pages about his wife ! How melancholy to know that 
such high natures as his and hers generally fail to meet in close 
intimacy here below, and therefore live and die more than half 
unknown, waiting for the hereafter. God bless you, my very dear 
children. 

Your loving 

Mother 

Pembroke Lodge, November 9, 1873 

Visit from Mr. Herbert Spencer, who stayed to dinner. Long, 
deep, interesting conversation ; all amounting to " we know 
nothing," he assuring me that the prospect of annihilation has no 
terrors for him ; I feeling that without immortality life is " all 
a cheat," and without a Father in heaven, right and wrong, love, 
conscience, joy, sorrow, are words without a meaning and the 
Universe, if governed at all, is governed by a malignant spirit who 
gives us hopes, and aspirations never to be fulfilled, affections to 
be wasted, a thirst for knowledge never to be quenched. 



1870 78] HERBERT SPENCER 241 

" 1874 opened brightly and peacefully on our dear home," 
she writes ; but it was to prove one of the saddest years in 
their lives. Only some of the heavy trials and sorrows that 
they were called upon to bear from this time onward will be 
touched upon here. They were borne by Lord and Lady 
Russell with heroic courage and unfaltering faith. 

Lady Russell to Lady Dunfermline 

Pembroke Lodge, February 25, 1874 

I am now just finishing the " Heart of Midlothian," and with 
more intense admiration for it than ever — the beauty and natural- 
ness of every word spoken by Jeanie and Effie before the last 
volume, of a great deal of Davie Deans, of many of the scenes 
scattered through the book are, I think, not to be surpassed. 
More tenderness and depth and heart-breakingness I should say 
than in any of Sir Walter's. ... I turned to Sir Walter from 
" The Parisians." I doubt whether I shall finish it, a false, 
glittering, disagreeable atmosphere. 

Lady Russell to Lord and Lady Amberley 

Pembroke Lodge, March 2, 1874 
My dear Children, — . . . We had a charming visit from Sir 
Henry Taylor a few days ago, a long quiet real " crack " about 
many books and many authors, with a little touch of the events of 
the day — change of Ministry, causes of our utter defeat, which he 
thinks obscure, so do I — not creditable to the country, so do I — in 
so far as Disraeli can hardly be reckoned more trustworthy or 
consistent than Gladstone, and Gladstone's untrustworthiness and 
inconsistency are supposed to have caused his overthrow. The 
Queen made Sir John Cowell write me a note to find out whether 
John would be disposed to go to the great banquet next Tuesday 
and sleep at Windsor. Kindly done of her — of course he 
declines. I read Herbert Spencer on "The Bias of Patriotism," 
yesterday — much of it truly excellent. To-day I am at "Progress" 
in the Essays ... of which I have read several here and there. 
Whenever I have the feeling that /, not Herbert Spencer, have 
written what I am reading, I have the delightful sensation of 
complete agreement and unqualified admiration of his (or my) 
wisdom. When I have not that feeling, I stop to consider, but 
even then have sometimes the candour to come to his conclusions ; 
while at some passages, less frequent, I inwardly exclaim, " I 
never did, I do not now, and I never shall agree." The want of 
what Sir Henry Taylor calls " the spiritual instinct " is striking 



242 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

in him. It is strange to turn to him as I have done from 
'' Memorials of a Quiet Life," which raises me into an atmo- 
sphere of heavenly calmness and joy, or ought to do so, although 
nobody ever felt the trials and sorrows of life more keenly than 
Mrs. Hare. . . . 

Good-bye, dearest children, your pets * are as well and as dear 
as pets can be. 

Your loving, 

Mother. 

In April Lady Russell lost her sister, Lady Dunfermline, 
who died in Rome. In May, Lord and Lady Russell's second 
son, who was dearly loved for his generous and noble nature, 
was seized with dangerous illness. He lived, but never 
recovered. In the summer. Lady Amberley and her little 
daughter Rachel, who was only six years old, died of diph- 
theria within a few days of each other. 

There is a touching reference to Lord Russell in a letter, 
written many years after his death, from Miss Elliot, daughter 
of the Dean of Bristol, to Lady Russell. 

One of the very last times I saw him you were out, and he 
sent word that he would see me when he knew I was at the 
door ; when he literally bowed his head and said, *' The hand of 
the Lord has been very heavy on us — very heavy," and spoke 
of little Rachel. I never remember being more touched and 
awed by the reverence I felt for him. 

Queen Vidotia to Lady Russell ^ 

Windsor Castle, June 29, 1874 
Dear Lady Russell, — I cannot remain silent without writing; 
to express to you my deep and sincere sympathy with you both, 
and especially with your poor son on this most sad event, which 
has deprived him of his wife, and his little children (whom I saw 
so lately) of an affectionate mother, in the very prime of life ! 
I saw the sad announcement in the papers this morning and could 
hardly believe it, never having heard even of her illness. This 

' Rachel and Bertrand, who stayed for the winter at Pembroke Lodge 
while their parents were abroad. 

" On several occasions Lord Russell had been prevented by the state 
of his health from accepting invitations to Windsor. In April, 1874, he 
and Lady Russell were touched by the Queen's kindness in coming tc 
visit them at Pembroke Lodge, and she had then seen Lord Amberlejr'j 
children. 



1870-78] LETTERS FROM THE QUEEN 243 

sad event will, I know, be a terrible blow to you, and to Lord 
Russell, and I know that you have had much sorrow and anxiety 
lately. Dear Lady Russell, I have known you both too long not 
to feel the truest and deepest interest in all that concerns you and 
yours — in weal and woe — and I would not delay a moment in 
writing to express this to you. You will, I know, look for support 
and for comfort where alone it can be found, and I pray that God 
may support and comfort you and your poor bereaved son. 

Ever yours affectionately, 

V. R. 

I should be very grateful if you would let me have any details 
of poor Lady Amberley's illness and death. 

Queen Victoria to Lady Russell 

Windsor Castle, July 3, 1874 
Dearest Lady Russell, — Your two sad and touching letters 
have affected me deeply, and I thank you much for writing to me. 
It is too dreadful that the dear little girl whose bright eyes and 
look of health I so well remember at Pembroke Lodge should 
also be taken. May God support your poor unhappy son, for 
whom your heart must bleed, and whose agony of grief and 
bereavement seems almost too much to bear. But if he will but 
trust our Father in Heaven, and feel all is sent in love, though he 
may have to go through months and years of the bitterest 
sufferings, and of anguish indescribable, he will find peace and 
resignation and comfort come at last — when it seems farthest. 
/ know this myself. For you, dear Lady Russell and dear Lord 
Russell, I do feel so deeply. Your trials have been so great 
lately. ... I shall be really grateful if you would write to me 
again to say how Lord Russell bears this new blow, and how 
your poor son Amberley is. Agatha, who is so devoted a 
daughter, will, I aiii sure, do all she can now to help and comfort 
you, but she will be deeply distressed herself. And poor dear 
Lady Clarendon is dying I fear, and poor Emily Russell only just 
confined, and unable to go and see her. It is dreadful. 

With fervent prayers that your health may not suffer, and that 
you may be mercifully supported. 

Ever yours affectionately, 

V. R. 

Lord Russell to Lady Minto 

Pembroke Lodge, July 3, 1874 
My dear Nina, — We are struck down by the death of my 
dear pet, Rachel, who was taken from us to stay with her parents 
at Ravenscroft. It was but too natural that Kate should wish to 



244 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

have her child with her, but the event is heart-breaking — such a 
darhng, so bright, so pretty. 

"Elle a dure ce que durent les roses, 
L'espace d'un matin." 

I am always touched by those French verses, and now I apply 
them tearfully. 

Ever yours affectionately, 

Russell 

In the summer of 1874 Lord Russell took Aldworth, 
Tennyson's beautiful home near Haslemere, where they 
remained for some months. 

Lady Russell to Lord Amberley 

Aldworth, Haslemere, November 10, 1874 
We have been going on in a happy humdrum way since I last 
wrote — humdrum as regards events, and all the happier that it 
should be so — but with no lack of delightful occupation and 
delightful conversation, and that intimate interchange of thought 
which makes home life so much fuller than society life. However, 
it would not do to go on long cut off from the world and its ways 
and from the blessing of the society of real friends, which 
unluckily can't be had without intermixture of wearisome 
acquaintances. 

Rollo's reader is reading Molesworth's " History of England 
for the last Forty Years," and Agatha takes advantage and listens, 
and I read it by myself, and as your father knows it all without 
reading it and likes to be talked to about it, we have been living a 
good deal in the great events of that period, and we find it a 
relief to turn from the mazy though deeply interesting flood of 
metaphysics which this age pours upon the world, to facts and 
events which also have their philosophy, and a deep one too. 

Pembroke Lodge, December 28, 1874 

Finished " Life of Prince Albert." It is seldom that a revela- 
tion of the inner life of Princes would raise the mind to a higher 
region than before — although we all know that they have an inner 
and a real life through the tinsels and the trappings in which we 
see them. But this book can hardly fail to raise any mind, warm 
any heart, brace any soul. Would that we all, in all conditions of 
life, kept truth and duty ever before us, as he did even amid the pet- 
tinesses of a Court — the solemn trifles of etiquette which would 
have stifled the nobleness of a less noble nature. Would that all 



1870-78] PRINCE ALBERT 245 

Princes had a Stockmar,^ but there are not many Stockmars in the 
world ; if there were, there would soon not be many Princes of 
the kind which now abounds, beings cut off from equality, 
friendship, freedom, by what in our supreme folly we call the 
" necessary " pomp and fetters of a Court. Noble as Prince 
Albert was, those things did him harm, and as Lady Lyttelton 

says, nobody but the organ knew what was in him 

The Queen appears in a charming light — truthfulness, humility, 
unbounded love for him. 

Lady Russell to Lord Amherley 

Pembroke Lodge, December 29, 1874 
M. d'Etchegoyen ^ has given me Mill's three essays. I have 
read " Nature," a great deal of which I like much, but were it to 
be read by the inhabitant of some other planet, he would have a 
very false notion of this one ; for Mill dwells almost entirely on 
the ugly and malevolent side of Nature, leaving out of sight the 
beautiful and benevolent side — whereas both abound, and suggest 
the notion of two powers at strife for the government of the world. 
If you bring the " Conscious Machine Controversy," I may read it, 
although I feel very uncharitable to the hard, presumptuous 
unwisdom of some modern metaphysics. 

Lady Russell to Lord Amberley 

Pembroke Lodge, March 28, 1875 
This is our Agatha's birthday, and the spirit moves me to 
write to you. Every marked day, whether marked by sorrow 
or by joy, turns my heart, if possible, more than usual to you, 
and makes me feel more keenly how all the joy and perfect 
happiness once yours has been turned to bitter sorrow and 
desolation. I find it is far, far more difficult to bear grief 
for one's children than for oneself, and sometimes my heart 
" has been like to break " as I have followed you in thought on 
your long and dreary journey, and remembered what your com- 
panionship was when last you went to the sunny South, to so 
many of the same places. You have indeed been sorely tried, my 

' " One of the best friends of the Queen and the Prince Consort was 
Baron Stockmar. This old nobleman, who had known the English Court 
since the days of George III, and loved Prince Albert like a son, 
was a man of sturdy independence, fearlessly outspoken, and regarded 
with affectionate confidence both by Queen Victoria and her Consort." — 
Daily News, May 7, 1910. This was what Lady Russell felt about him ; 
his fearless outspokenness at Court always impressed her, 

" The Comte and Comtesse d'Etchegoyen (nee Talleyrand) were 
intimate friends of Lord and Lady Russell. He was^a French Republican, 
who had been obliged to leave Paris at the Coup d'Eiat. 



246 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

child, and you have not — would that I could give it to you — the 
one and only rock of refuge and consolation, of faith in the wisdom 
and mercy of a God of love. But I trust in Him for you, and I 
know that though clouds hide Him from your sight. He will care 
for you and not forsake you — and even here on earth I look for- 
ward to much peaceful happiness for you, in your children, in books, 
in nature, in duties zealously done, in the love and sympathy of 
many — " Mutter Treu ist ewig neu," and that you may find some 
rest to your aching heart in that Mutter Treue, which is always 
hovering round you, wherever you are, and to which every day 
seems to add fresh strength and renewed longing to give you 
comfort, is my daily, nightly hope and prayer. May this letter find 
you well and cheerful and able to enjoy the loveliness of sea and 
sky and mountain ; if so, I know it will not sadden you to get this 
drop out of the ocean of my thoughts about you — thoughts which 
the freshness of the wounds makes it intensely difficult for me to 
utter. . . . Kiss my two precious little boys and keep us in their 
memory. Is Bertrand as full of fun and merriment as he used to 
be ? Poor pets ! they look to you for all the tenderness of father 
and mother combined in order to be as happy as children ought 
to be. Give it them largely, my child, as it is in your nature to 
do. . . . God bless you all. 

In August, 1875, Lady Russell notes in her diary that her 
husband had written a letter to the Times giving his support 
to the Herzegovina insurgents. During the few years pre- 
ceding 1876 he had become convinced that the days of 
Turkish misrule in the Christian provinces must be ended.=f 
He frequently spoke with indignation of the systematic 
murders contrived by the Turkish Government and officials, 
and felt that the cause of the oppressed Christians deserved 
support, and that the time for upholding the rule of the Sultan 
as a cardinal principle in our policy had passed. He threw 
himself with the greatest heartiness into a movement for the 
aid of the insurgents. Though in his eighty-third year he was 
the first British statesman to break with the past and to bless 
the uprising of liberty in the near East. In the following 
letter, written from Caprera on September 17, 1875, the 
generous sympathy between him and Garibaldi found fresh 
expression. 

' In 1874 he wrote that from Adrianople to Belgrade all government 
should be in the hands of the Christians. 



1870-78] HERZEGOVINA 247 

MoN Illustre Ami, — En associant votre grand nom au bien- 
faiteurs des Chretiens opprimes par le Gouvernement Turc, vous 
avez ajoute un bien precieux bijou a la couronne humanitaire qui 
ceint votre noble front. En i860 votre parole sublime sonna en 
faveur des Rayahs Italiens, et I'ltalie n'est plus une expression 
geographique. Aujourd'hui vous plaidez la cause des Rayahs 
Turcs, plus malheureux encore. C'est une cause qui vaincra 
comrne la premiere, et Dieu benira vos vieux ans. . . . Je baise 
la main a votre precieuse epouse, et suis pour la vie votre devoue 

G. Garibaldi.^ 



About a year later Lady Russell writes : " Great meetings at 
the Guildhall and Exeter Hall — fine spirit-stirring speech of 
Fawcett at the last. The feeling of the nation makes me proud, 
as it does to remember that John was the first to foresee the 
magnitude of the coming storm, when the first grumblings were 
heard in Herzegovina — the first to feel sympathy with the in- 
surgents. . . . Many a nation may be roused to a sense of its 
own wrongs, but to see a whole people fired with indignation 
for the wrongs of another and a remote country, with no selfish 
afterthought, no possible prospect of advantage to what are 
called ' British Interests,' is grand indeed." 

The last entry calls to mind a passage by Mr. Froude in 
the Life of Lord Beaconsfield : 2 " The spirit of a great 
nation called into energy on a grand occasion is one of the 
noblest of human phenomena. The pseudo-national spirit 
of Jingoism is the meanest and the most dangerous." 

At the beginning of 1876 Lord Russell still retained so 
much health and vigour that his doctor spoke of him as being 
in some respects "like a man in the prime of life." But 
another great sorrow now befell them. Their eldest son, Lord 
Amberley, died on January 9th. He was only thirty-three. In 

' "My Illustrious Friend, — In associating your great name with the 
benefactors of the Christians oppressed by the Turkish Government, you 
have added a most precious jewel to the crown of humanity which 
encircles your noble brow. In i860 your sublime word was spoken in 
favour of the Italian Rayahs, and Italy is no longer only a geographical 
expression. To-day you plead the cause of the Turkish Rayahs, even 
more unhappy. It is a cause which will conquer like the first, and God 
will bless your old age. I kiss the hand of your dear wife, and remain for 
life your devoted G. Garibaldi." 

^ " Life of the Earl of Beaconsfield," J. A. Froude, p. 251. 



248 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

his short life he had shown great independence of mind and 
unusual ability. His two boys ^ now came to live perma- 
nently at Pembroke Lodge. Something of his character may 
be gathered from the following letter from Dr. Jowett, who 
had known him well at Oxford. 

Projessor yowett to Lady Russell 

jfanuary 14, 1876 

I am grieved to hear of the death of Lord Amberley ; I read 
it by accident in the newspaper of yesterday. I fear it must be a 
terrible blow both to you and Lord Russell. 

I will not intrude upon your sorrow, but I would like to tell you 
what I thought of him. He was one of the best men I ever knew 
— most truthful and disinterested. He was not of the world, and 
therefore not likely to be popular with the world. He had chosen 
a path which was very difficult, and could hardly have been carried 
out in practical politics, I think that latterly he saw this and 
was content to live seeking after the truth in the companion- 
ship of his wife, whose memory I shall always cherish. Some 
persons may grieve over them because they had not the ordinary 
hopes and consolations of religion. This does not add to my 
sorrow for them except in so far as it deprived them of sympathy 
and happiness while they were living. It must inevitably happen 
in these times, when everything is made the subject of inquiry 
with many good persons. God does not regard men with reference 
to their opinion about Himself or about a future world, but with 
reference to what they really are. In holding fast to truth and 
righteousness they held the greater part of what we mean by 
belief in God. No person's religious opinions affect the truth 
either about themselves or others. One who said to me what 
I have said to you about your son's remarkable goodness (while 
condemning his opinions) was Lady Augusta Stanley,^ who herself, 
I fear, has not long to live. 

Dean Stanley {Dean of Westminster) to Lady Russell 

Dear Lady Russell, — Will you allow one broken heart to say 
a word of sympathy to another ? — the life of my life is ebbing away 
— the hope of your life is gone. She, I trust, will find in the 
fountain of all Love the love in which she has trusted on earth. 
He, I trust, will find in the fountain of all Light the truth after which 
he sought on earth. May God help us both in His love. 

Ever yours most truly, 

A, P. Stanley 

' Frank (afterwards Earl Russell), who was then ten years old, and 
Bertrand, three years old. 
* Wife of Dean Stanley. 



1870-78] DEATH OF LORD AMBERLEY 249 

Queen Victoria to Lady Russell 

Osborne, January 11, 1876 

Dear Lady Russell, — My heart bleeds for you. A new and 
very heavy blow has fallen upon you, who were already so sorely 
tried ! Most deep and sincere is my sympathy with you and Lord 
Russell, and I cannot say how I feel for you. It is so terrible to 
see one's children go before one ! You will be a mother to the 
orphans and the fatherless, as I know how kind and loving you 
were always to them. 

Trusting that your health will not suffer, and asking you to 
remember me to Agatha, who will be a great comfort to you, as 
she has ever been, believe me always, 

Yours affectionately, 

V. R. 

In March they began once more to see their friends. 
" Seeing those I have not yet seen," she writes, " is like 
meeting them after years — so changed is our world." 

Pembroke Lodge, March 15, 1876 

The dear old beech-tree in the wood blown down, and with it 
countless recollections of happy hours under its shade with merry 
boys climbing it above our heads, and little Agatha playing at our 
feet, and her elder sisters chatting with us and looking for nests 
and flowers. All, all gone. The bitter gales of sorrow have blown 
down our fair hopes and turned our joys to sorrow. Poor old beech- 
tree 1 Like us, it had lost its fair boughs ; like it, we shall soon lay 
down our stripped and shattered stems. 

Pembroke Lodge, April 25, 1876 

The loveliness of early spring — its nameless, countless tints, its 
music and its flowers, never went deeper into my soul — but oh I 
the happy springtide of life, where is that ? 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, January 27, 1877 

^^ Do not grieve too! much over all our trials, dear Lotty. We 
have not long to bear them now, and all will be made clear by 
and by. All the sorrows of all the world will be seen in their 
true light, and tears will be wiped from all eyes for ever. I often 
think, though I try to drive away the thought, how unspeakably 
soothing and happy it would have been to looki'fback upon 
a smooth, uneventful life, unbroken in its joys except by such 



250 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

blows as must fall to the lot of all who live long, instead of to a 
life of many strange and unexpected and terrible shocks of many 
kinds. But oftener, far oftener, I feel the brightness and blessed- 
ness of my lot ; so bright and so blessed in many wonderful 
ways ; and never, never at any moment would I have exchanged 
it for another. Dearest Lotty, your loving letter has brought all 
this upon you, and it shall go with all its selfishness to Laverstoke, 
and not into the fire, where I am inclined to put it. . . . God 
bless you, dear Lotty. 

Your loving sister, 

F. R. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, January 4, 1878 
I am reading the third volume of Prince Albert, and love and 
admire him more and more — but am very angry with the book as 
regards John : the unfairness from omission of all particulars which 
he alone could have given with regard to his resignation on 
Roebuck's motion, and his non-resignation after Vienna, is 
something I cannot forgive. 

Early in this year, 1878, Lady Russell writes of a dinner- 
party at Lord Selborne's : 

Agatha and I dined in town, with the Selbornes. I between 
Lord Selborne and Gladstone, who was as usual most agreeable 
and most eloquent, giving life and fervour to conversation whatever 
was the subject. " The Eastern Question," the " Life of Prince 
Albert," the comedy of " Diplomacy," the different degrees of 
" parliamentary courage " in different statesmen, etc. He said 
that in his opinion Sir Robert Peel, my husband, and, " I must 
give the devil his due," Disraeli, were the three statesmen whom 
he had known who had the most '* parliamentary courage." 

In the summer of 1877 Lord Russell had taken a house 
overlooking the sea near Broadstairs. But he was falling 
into a gradual decline, the consequence of great age, and 
after they came home from Broadstairs, he never again left 
Pembroke Lodge. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, January 11, 1878 
Do not think too much of the pain to me, but of the mercy of 
there being none to him, in this gradual extinction of a mind which 



1870-78] RETROSPECT 251 

gave light to so many, of affections which made home so happy. 
My worst pain is over — was over long ago — the pain of first 
acknowledging to myself my own loneliness, without the guide, 
the example, the support, which so long were mine — without those 
golden joys of perfect companionship which made the hours fly 
when we sat and talked together on many an evening of blessed 
memory, or strolled together among our trees and our flowers, or 
snatched a few moments together from his days and nights of 
noble toil in London. All this is over, all this and much more, 
but gratitude that it has been remains, and the bright hope of a 
renewal of companionship hereafter gives strength and courage for 
present duties and passing trials. 

Mr. George W. E. Russell, in the closing passage of 
an article on his uncle,': wrote of these last years of his life : 
"... Thus in peace and dignity that long life of public and 
private virtue neared its close ; in a home made bright by the 
love of friends and children, and tended by the devotion of her 
who for more than five-and-thirty years had been the good 
angel of her husband's house." 

Pembroke Lodge, April 19, 1878 

I have just been sitting with my dearest husband ; he has said 
precious words such as I did not expect ever to hear from him, 
for his mind is seldom, very seldom clear. We were holding one 
another's hands : " I hope I haven't given you much trouble." 
" How, dearest ? " " In watching over me." Then by and by 
he said, " I have made mistakes, but in all I did my object was the 
public good." Again, " I have sometimes seemed cold to my 
friends — but it was not in my heart." He said he had enjoyed 
his life. I said, " I hope you enjoy it now." He said, " Yes, except 
that I am too much confined to my bed. . . . I'm very old — I'm 
eighty-five." He then talked of his birthday being in July. I told 
him it was in August, but our wedding-day was in July, and it would 
be thirty-seven years next July since we were married. He said, 
** Oh, I'm so glad we've passed it so happily together." I said I had 
not always been so good to him as I ought to have been. " Oh yes, 
you have, very good indeed." At another moment he said, *' I'm 
quite ready to go now." Asked him where to ? " To my grave, 
to my death." He also said, " Do you see me sometimes placing 
my hands in this way ? " (he was clasping them together). '* That 
always means devotion — that I am asking God to be good to me." 
His voice was much broken by tears as he said these things. 

' Contemporary Review, December, 1889. 



252 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

Pembroke Lodge, April 20, 1878 

Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone to tea. Both most cordial and kind. 
Mr. Gladstone in his most agreeable mood. Eastern Question only 
slightly touched. Other subjects : increase of drunkenness ; 
Northumberland election, which has raised his spirits, whether 
Albert Grey be returned or not ; Life of Prince Albert, whom he 
admires heartily, but who according to him (and John) did not 
understand the British Constitution. Called Stockmar a " mis- 
chievous old prig." Said " Liberty is never safe," that even in 
this country an unworthy sovereign might endanger her even 
now. John sent down to say he wished to see them. I took them 
to him for a few minutes — happily he was clear in his mind — and 
said to Mr. Gladstone, " I'm sorry you are not in the Ministry," and 
kissed her affectionately, and was so cordial to both that they were 
greatly touched. 

Pembroke Lodge, May 9, 1878 

Great day. Nonconformist deputation presented address to 
John on the fiftieth anniversary of Repeal of the Corporation and 
Test Acts, Alas ! that he could not see them. All cordial and 
friendly, and some with strikingly good countenances. Edm.ond 
Fitzmaurice happened to call, stayed, and spoke admirably. Lord 
Spencer also called just before they came to congratulate him, but 
I stupidly did not think of asking him to stay. Those of the 
deputation who spoke did so extremely well. It was a proud and 
a sad day. We had hoped some time ago that he might perhaps 
see the deputation for a moment in his room, but he was too ill for 
that to be possible. 

Lord Russell died on May 28, 1878, at Pembroke Lodge. 

Queen Victoria to Lady Russell 

Balmoral, May 30, 1878 

Dear Lady Russell, — It was only yesterday afternoon I learnt 
through the papers that your dear husband had left this world of 
sorrows and trials peacefully, and full of years, the night before, 
or I would have telegraphed or written sooner ! You will believe 
that I truly regret an old friend of forty years' standing, and whose 
personal kindness in trying and anxious times I shall ever re- 
member. " Lord John," as I knew him best, was one of my first 
and most distinguished Ministers, and his departure recalls many 
eventful times. To you, dear Lady Russell, who were ever one 
of the most devoted of wives, this must be a terrible blow, though 
you must have for some time been prepared for it. But one is 
never prepared for the blow when it comes. And you have had 



1870-78] DEATH OF LORD RUSSELL 253 

such trials and sorrows of late years that I most truly sympathize 
with you. Your dear and devoted daughter will, I know, be the 
greatest possible comfort to you, and I trust that your grandsons 
will grow up to be all that you could wish. 

Believe me always, yours affectionately, 

V. R. I, 

Mr. John Bright to Lady Russell 

June I, 1878 
Dear Lady Russell, — . . . What I particularly observed in 
the public life of Lord John — you once told me you liked his 
former name and title — was a moral tone, a conscientious feeling, 
something higher and better than is often found in the guiding 
principle of our most active statesmen, and for this I always 
admired and reverenced him. His family may learn from him, 
his country may and will cherish his memory. You alone can tell 
what you have lost. . . . 

Ever very sincerely yours, 

John Bright 

Lady Minto to Lady Russell 

June 4, 1878 
I have been thinking of you all day, and indeed through many 
hours of the night. ... I rather wished to hear that the Abbey 
was to have been his resting place — but after all it matters little 
since his abiding place is in the pages of English history. . . . 
What none could thoroughly appreciate except those who lived in 
his intimacy was the perfect simplicity which made him the most 
easily amused of men, ready to pour out his stores of anecdote to 
old and young — to discuss opinions on a level with the most 
humble of interlocutors, and take pleasure in the commonest forms 
of pleasantness — a fine day, a bright flower. Nor do I think that 
the outside world understood from what depth of feeling the tears 
rose to his eyes when tales of noble conduct or any high sentiment 
touched some responsive chord — nor how much " poetic fire " lay 
under that calm, not cold manner. ... I remember often going 
down to you when London was full of some political anger against 
him — when personalities and bitterness were rife — and returning 
from you with the feeling of having been in another world, so 
entire was the absence of such bitterness, so gentle and peaceful 
were the impressions I carried away. 

Lady Russell went with her family early in July to St. Fillans, 
in Perthshire, for a few months of perfect quiet among the 
Scotch lakes and mountains. Queen Victoria's kindness in asking 
her to remain at Pembroke Lodge was a great comfort to her. 



254 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1870-78 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, J^une 30, 1878 
Just a word with you, my own Lotty, before leaving home. 
Oh the blessing of being still able to call it home, darkened for 
ever as it is, for the multiplying memories with which it is 
thronged make it dearer as well as sadder every day of my life ! 
Lotty, shall I ever believe that he has left me, quite left me, never 
to return ? Will the fearful silence ever cease to startle me ? 
Whenever I came in from a walk or a drive I used to know almost 
before I opened his door, by the sound of his voice, or of some- 
thing, whether all was well with him, and now there is only that 
deadly silence. And yet, I often feel if I had but courage to go in, 
surely I must find him, surely he must be waiting for me and 
wanting me. But how foolish to talk of any one form of this un- 
utterable blank, which meets me at every turn, intertwined with 
everything I say or do, and taking a new shape every moment, and 
the yearning and the aching which have been my portion for four 
years — the yearning for my other lost loved ones, for my dear, dear 
boys, seems more terrible than ever now that this too has come 
upon me. ... I pass my husband's sitting-room window — 
there are the roses he loved so well, hanging over them in all 
their summer beauty, but he does not call me to give him one. 
I come in, and there on the walls of my room are pictures of the 
three, but not one of them answers me — -silence, nothing but 
deadly silence ! I know all is well, and I feel in my inmost heart 
that this last sorrow is a blessed one, saving us from far worse, and 
taking him to his rest, and I never for a moment forget what 
treasures beyond price are left to my old age still. 



CHAPTER XIII 

1878-98 

LADY RUSSELL survived her husband nearly twenty 
years. From the time of Lord Russell's death in May, 
1878, till 1890, she kept no diary, but not long before her 
death she wrote for her children a few recollections of some 
of the events during those twelve years. 

In May, 1880, Lady Victoria Villiers died, leaving a widowed 
husband and many children. Her death was a great sorrow 
to Lady Russell, who wrote of her as "a perfect wife and 
mother." 

In the summer of 1883 her son RoUo bought a place — 
Dunrozel — near Haslemere, and from this time till 1891 Lady 
Russell spent a few months every year at Dunrozel.^ In 1891 
and 1892 she took a house on Hindhead — some miles from 
Haslemere — for a few months. She enjoyed and loved the 
beautiful wild heather country, which reminded her of Scot- 
land, but after 1892 she felt that home was best for her, and 
never again left Pembroke Lodge. 

In 1885 the marriage of her son RoUo to Miss Alice God- 
frey was a great happiness to her. But in little more than a 
year, soon after the birth of a son, Mrs. RoUo Russell died, 
and again Lady Russell suffered deeply, for she always found 
the sorrows of her children harder to bear than her own. 

To retire more and more from the world of many engage- 
ments and important affairs was easy to her, easier than it 
proves to many who have figured there with less distinction. 

' They named it Dunrozel after Rozel in Normandy, supposed to be 
the original home of the Russells. 

2S5 



256 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Playing a prominent part in that world does not make people 
happy ; but, as a rule, it prevents them from being contented 
with anything else. It was not so with her ; in the days most 
crowded with successes and excitements her thoughts kept 
flying home. She had always felt that a quiet, busy family 
life was the one most natural to her. When she was a girl at 
Minto, helping to educate her younger brothers and sisters, 
she had written in her diary : 

August 26, 1836 

Chiefly unto children, O Lord, do I feel myself called ; in 
them I see Thy image reflected more pure than in anything else 
in this sinful though beautiful world, and in serving them my love 
to Thee increases. 

Her wish was fulfilled to an unusual degree. One of 
a large family of brothers and sisters, she was still helping 
in the education of the younger ones when she married, 
and her marriage at once brought her the care of a young 
family ; soon, too, children of her own ; while her old 
age brought her the charge of successive grandchildren. 
During the lifetime of Lord and Lady Amberley their chil- 
dren often spent many months at Pembroke Lodge while their 
parents were abroad, and when both father and mother had 
died the two boys came to live with their grandparents. Ten 
years later her youngest son's boy was brought to her on the 
day of his mother's death, when he was two months old, and 
remained with her till her son's second marriage in 1891, The 
children of her stepdaughters were also loving grandchildren 
to her, and often came for long visits to Pembroke Lodge. 

Lady Russell had sometimes thought that when days of 

leisure came, she would give some of her time to literary 

work, and write reminiscences of the many interesting men 

and women she had known and the stirring events she had 

lived through ; but the unexpected and daily cares and duties 

which came upon her made this impossible.^ She was one 

who would never neglect the living needs of those around 

* The only book Lady Russell published was " Family Worship " ; a 
small volume of selections from the Bible and prayers for daily use. It 
was first published in 1876. 



1878-98] PETERSHAM FRIENDS 257 

her, and she gave her time and thoughts to the care of her 
grandchildren with glad and loving devotion. 

One of her greatest pleasures was to see her own ideals 
and enthusiasms reflected in the young ; and next to the care 
of her family the prosperity of the village school at Petersham 
was perhaps nearest her heart. It grew and flourished through 
her devotion. In 1891 it was generously taken over by the 
British and Foreign School Society, but the change made no 
difference to her interest nor to the time she gave to it. The 
warm affection of the people of Petersham was a great happi- 
ness to her ; after long illness and enforced absence from 
the village she wrote to her daughter : " You can't think what 
good it did me to see a village friend again." 

The feeling among the villagers may be gathered from two 
brief passages in letters written after her death ; a gardener in 
Petersham alluded to her as "our much-loved friend, Countess 
Russell," and another man — who had been educated at Peter- 
sham School — wrote : " She was really like a mother to many 
of we ' Old Scholars. ' " 

Lady Russell's letters will show that her interest in politics 
remained as keen as ever to the end ; and she eagerly watched 
the changes which affected Ireland. To the end of her life 
she retained the fervour of her youthful Radicalism, and with 
advancing years her religious opinions became more and more 
broad. To her there was no infallibility in any Bible, any 
prophet, any Church. With an ever-deepening reverence for 
the life and teaching of Jesus, she yet felt that " The highest 
Revelation is not made by Christ, but comes directly from 
the Universal Mind to our minds." ^ Her last public appear- 
ance in Richmond was at the opening of the new Free 
Church, on April 16, 1896, which she had joined some years 
before as being the community holding views nearer to her 
own than any other. 

There is a side of Lady Russell's mind which her letters do 
not adequately represent. She was a great reader, and in her 
letters (written off with surprising rapidity) she does not often 
say much about the books she was so fond of discussing in 

' Rev. F. W. Robertson, of Brighton. Sermons, ist Series, 
s 



258 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

talk. Among novelists, Sir Walter Scott was perhaps the one 
she read most often ; Jane Austen too was a favourite ; but she 
also much enjoyed many of the later novelists, especially 
Charles Dickens and George Eliot. 

In poetry her taste was in some respects the taste of an 
earlier generation ; she could not join, for instance, in the 
depreciation of Byron, nor could she sympathize with the un- 
bounded admiration for Keats which she met with among the 
young. Milton, Cowper, Burns, Byron, and Longfellow were 
among those oftenest read, but Shakespeare always remained 
supreme, and as the years went by her wonder and admiration 
seemed only to grow stronger and deeper with every fresh 
reading of his greatest plays ; and the intervals without some 
Shakespeare reading, either aloud or to herself, were short and 
rare. She had not an intimate knowledge of Shelley, but in 
the later years of her life she became deeply impressed by the 
beauty and music of his poetry, which she liked best to hear 
read aloud. 

Tennyson she loved, and latterly also Browning, with 
protests against his obscurity and his occasionally most 
unmusical English. The inspiration of his brave and 
optimistic philosophy she felt strongly. She was extremely 
fond of reading Dante, and she was better acquainted 
with German and Italian poetry than most cultivated 
women. But though she read much and often in the works 
of famous writers, this did not prevent her keeping abreast 
with the literature of the day. She was strongly attracted by 
speculative books, not too technical, and by the works of 
theologians whose views were broad and tolerant of doubt. 
In 1847 she mentions reading some of Dr. Channing's writings 
" with the greatest delight " ; and some years afterwards she 
wrote: "Began 'Life of Channing'; interesting in the highest 
degree — an echo of all those high and noble thoughts of 
which this earth is not yet worthy, but which I firmly believe 
will one day reign on it supreme." In later years she was 
deeply impressed by the writings of Dr. Martineau, and read 
many of his books. But she was not interested in philo- 
sophical inquiry for its own sake ; it was the importance of 



1878-98] VERSES TO ROGERS 259 

the moral and religious issues at stake in such discussions that 
attracted her. History and biography it was natural she 
should read eagerly, and it was characteristic of her to praise 
and condemn actions long past with an intensity such as is 
usually excited by contemporary events. Until a few years 
before her death she rose early to secure a space of time for 
reading and meditation before the duties of the day began. 
Unless ill-health could be pleaded, fiction and light reading 
were banished from the morning hours. She believed in 
strict adherence to such self-imposed sumptuary regulations, 
whether they applied to the body or to the pleasures of the mind. 

In the course of her long life she became personally 
acquainted with nearly all the principal writers of the Victorian 
era, and some of them she knew well. 

Among the earliest friends of Lord and Lady John Russell 
were Sydney Smith, Thomas Moore, and Macaulay. There 
is a note in verse written by Lady John to Samuel Rogers, 
which will serve at least to suggest how readily her fancy and 
good spirits might run into rhyme on the occasion of some 
family rejoicing or for a children's play. 

To Mr. RogerSy who was expected to breakfast and forgot to come 

Chesham Place, 1843 
When a poet a lady offends 

Is it prose her forgiveness obtains ? 
And from Rogers can less make amends 
Than the humblest and sweetest of strains? 

In glad expectation our board 

With roses and lilies we graced ; 
But alas ! the bard kept not his word, 

He came not for whom they were placed. 

Sad and silent our toast we bespread, 

At the empty chair looked we and sighed ; 

All insipid tea, butter, and bread. 
For the salt of his wit was denied. 

Now in wrath we acknowledge how well 
He the "Pleasures of Memory" who drew 

For mankind from his magical shell 

Gives the " Pains of Forgetfulness " too. 



26o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Rogers wrote in answer : — 

Cara, Carissima, Crudelissima, — If such is to be the reward 

for my transgressions, what crimes shall I not commit before I 

die ? I shall shoot Victoria to-day, and Louis Philippe to-morrow. 

But to be serious, I am at a loss how to thank you as I ought. 

How I lament that I have hung my harp upon the willow ! 

Yours ever, 

S. R. 

In later years Thackeray and Charles Dickens were wel- 
come guests, and the cordial friendship between Lord and 
Lady John and Dickens lasted till his death in 1870. Dickens 
said in a speech at Liverpool in 1869 that "there was no man 
in England whom he respected more in his public capacity, 
loved more in his private capacity, or from whom he had 
received more remarkable proofs of his honour and love of 
literature than Lord John Russell." 

Among poets, Tennyson and Browning were true friends ; 
Longfellow also visited Pembroke Lodge, and impressed Lady 
Russell by his gentle and spiritual nature ; and Lowell was one 
of her most agreeable guests. With Sir Henry Taylor, whose 
" Philip van Artevelde " she admired, the intercourse was, 
from her youth to old age, intimate and affectionate. 

Mr. Lecky, a faithful friend, gave a picture of the society 
at Pembroke Lodge, which may be quoted here : 

For some year^fter Lord Russell's retirement from ministerial 
life he gathered around him at Pembroke Lodge a society that 
could hardly be equalled — certainly not surpassed-— in England. 
In the summer Sunday afternoons there might be seen beneath the 
shade of those majestic oaks nearly all that was distinguished in 
English politics, and much that was distinguished in English 
literature, and few eminent foreigners visited England without 
making a pilgrimage to the old statesman.^ 

Mr. Frederic Harrison was one of Lady Russell's best 
friends in the last years of her life, and her keen interest in 
the Irish Question brought her into close and intimate inter- 
course with Mr. Justin McCarthy, who knew her so well in 

' " Life of Lord John Russell," by Stuart J. Reid, p. 351. 



1878-98] SIR HENRY TAYLOR 261 

these days of busy and sequestered old age that his recollec- 
tions, given in the last chapter of this volume, are valuable. 

Among the men of science she knew best were Sir Richard 
Owen, a near neighbour in Richmond Park, Sir Joseph 
Hooker, and Professor Tyndall, one of the most genial and 
delightful of her guests. 

There is a passage in Sir Henry Taylor's autobiography 
which speaks of her in earlier times,i but it expresses an 
impression she made till her death on many who met her : 

I have been rather social lately, . . . and went to a party at 
Lord John Russell's, where I met the Archbishop of York. . . . 
A better meeting was with Lady Lotty Elliot, the one of the 
Minto Elliots who is now about the age that her elder sisters were 
when I first knew them some sixteen or eighteen years ago. . . . 
They are a fine set of girls and women, those Minto Elliots, full 
of literature and poetry and nature ; and Lady John, whom I 
knew best in former days, is still very attractive to me ; and now 
that she is relieved from the social toils of a First Minister's wife, 
I mean to renew and improve my relations with her, if she has no 
objection. . . . She is very interesting to me, as having kept 
herself pure from the world with a fresh and natural and not 
ungifted mind in the world's most crowded ways. I recollect 
some years ago going through the heart of the City, somewhere 
behind Cheapside, to have come upon a courtyard of an antique 
house, with grass and flowers and green trees growing as quietly 
as if it was the garden of a farm-house in Northumberland. Lady 
John reminds me of it. 

The charm of her company, apart from the kindliness of 
her manner, lay in an immediate responsiveness to all that 
was going on around her, and the sense her talk and presence 
conveyed of a life controlled by a homely, dignified, strenuous 
tradition. It was the spontaneity of her sympathy which all 
her life long drew to her defenders, dispirited or hopeful, of 
struggling causes, and so many idealists, confident or resigned, 
shabby or admired. Any with a cause at heart, an end to 
aim at beyond personal ends, found in her a companion who 
seemed at once to understand how bitter were the checks or 
how important the triumphs they had met, and to them her 

• 1852. 



262 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

company was a singular refreshment and inspiration, amid the 
polite or undisguised indifference of the world. She could 
listen with ardour ; and if this sympathy was there for com- 
parative strangers, still more was it at the service of those who 
possessed her affection. She reflected instantaneously their 
joys and troubles ; indeed, she made both so much her own 
that those she loved were often tempted at first to hide their 
troubles from her. Such natures cannot usually disguise their 
emotions, and though she could conceal her own physical 
sufferings so as almost to mislead those with whom she lived, 
her feelings were plainly legible. If anything was said in her 
presence which pained her, her distress was visible in a 
moment ; and as a beautiful consequence of this transparent 
expressiveness, her gaiety was infectious and her affection 
shone out upon those she loved with tenderest radiance. 

* * * 

After Lord Russell's death political events can no longer 
be used as a thread to connect her letters and other writings 
together ; but the following passages, chosen over man\^ 3'ears, 
will, it is hoped, give to those who never knew her some idea 
of her as she is remembered by those who did. 

On Lady Georgiana Peel's first birthday after the death of 
her father Lady Russell sent her the following verses : 

To GEORGY 

For her Birthday ^ February 6, 1879. 
Tune : " Lochnagar.'" 

What music so early, so gently awakes me, 
And why as I listen these fast falling tears ; 

And what is the magic that so swiftly takes me 

Far back on my road, o'er the dust of dead years ? 

Voice of the past, in thy sweetness and sadness 
Thy magic enthralling, thy beauty and power, 

Oh voice of the past ! in thy deep holy sadness, 
I know thee and yield to thee one little hour. 



1878-98] MEMORIES 263 

Once more rings the birthday with merry young laughter, 
Our bairnies once more are around us at play ; 

Their little hearts reck not of what may come after, 
As lightly they weave the fresh flowers of to-day. 

Now to thy father's loved hand gaily clinging, 
To ask for the kiss he stoops fondly to gi'e ; 

To his care-laden spirit once more thou art bringing 
The freshness of thine, bonny winsome wee Gee ! ^ 

Thy rosy young cheek to my own thou art pressing. 
Thy little arms twining around me I feel. 

And thy Father in Heaven to thank for each blessing, 
I see thee beside me in innocence kneel. 

When the dread shadow of sickness is o'er me, 
I see thee, a lassie all brightness and bloom ; 

Still, still through thy tears strewing blossoms before me, 
Still watching beside me through silence and gloom. 



Hushed now is the music ! and hushed be my weeping 
For days that return not and light that hath fled. 

No more from their rest may I summon the sleeping, 
Or linger to gaze on the years that are dead. 

Fadeth my dream — and my day is declining. 

But love lifts the gloamin' and smooths the rough way ; 

And I hail the bright midday o'en thee that is shining. 
And think of a home that will ne'er pass away. 

Early in 1879 Lady Russell began again to have more 
intercourse with her friends in London, and in May she went 
with her son and daughter to the Alexandra Hotel for a short 
stay in town. She writes in her Recollections : 

In May (1879) we spent ten days at the Alexandra Hotel, in 
the midst of many kind friends and acquaintances. It was strange 
to be once more in " the crowd, the hum, the shock of men " as of 
old — and all so changed, so solitary within. . . . We there first 
saw Mr. Justin McCarthy — he has since become a true friend, and 
his companionship and conversation are always delightful ; as with 
so warm a heart and so bright an intellect they could not fail to be. 
' The name she was called by in her childhood. 



264 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

In April, 1880, when Mr. Gladstone's candidature in 
Midlothian was causing the greatest excitement and enthu- 
siasm, Lady Russell received this letter from Mrs. Gladstone. 



120, George Street, Edinburgh, April 4, 1880 

My dear Lady Russell, — We are so much touched by 
your letter and all the warmth and kindness you have shown 
to ourselves and Mary and Herbert. How can I thank you 
enough ? I see in your letter all the memories of the past, 
and that you can throw your kind heart into the present 
moment lovingly. The old precious memories only make you 
more alive to what is going on, as you think of him who had 
gone before and shown so noble an example to my husband. 
No doubt it did not escape you, words of my husband about 
Lord Russell. . . . All here goes on splendidly; the enthusiasm 
continues to increase, and all the returns have thrown us into a 
wild state of ecstasy and thankfulness. It is, indeed, a blessing 
passing all expectations, and I look back to all the time of anxiety 
beginning with the Bulgarian horrors, all my husband's anxious 
hard work of the past three or four years — how he was ridiculed 
and insulted — and now, thank God, we are seeing the extraordinary 
result of the elections, and listening to the goodness and greatness 
of the policy so shamefully slandered ; righteous indignation has 
burst forth. ... I loved to hear him saying aloud some of the 
beautiful psalms of thanksgiving as his mind became overwhelmed 
with gratitude and relieved with the great and good news. Thank 
you again and again for your letter. 

Yours affectionately, 

Catherine Gladstone 

Sir Mount Stuart Grant Duff^ to Lady Russell 

June 8, 1883 

As to the public questions at home — alas ! I can say nothing 
but echo what you and some other wise people tell me. One is 
far too much out of the whole thing. I do not fear the Radical, I 
greatly fear the Fadical, or crotchet-monger. . . . Your phrase 
about the division on the Affirmation Bill ^ rises to the dignity of a 

* At that time Governor of Madras. 

= In the April of 1881 Gladstone gave notice of an Affirmation Bill, to 
enable men like Mr. Bradlaugh to become members of Parliament without 
taking an oath which implied a belief in a Supreme Being. But it was 
not till 1883 that the Bill was taken up. On April 26th Gladstone made 
one of his most lofty and fervid speeches in support of the Bill, which, 
however, was lost by a majority of three. 



1878-98] DUNROZEL 265 

mot, and will be treasured by me as such. " The triumph of all 
that is worst in the name of all that is best." 

Lady Russell to Lady Agatha Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, J^une, 1883 

... I have been regaling myself on Sydney Smith's Life 
and Letters — the wisdom and the wit, the large-hearted and wide- 
minded piety, the love of God and man set forth in word and 
deed, and the unlikeness to anybody else, make it delightful 
companionship. ... I long to talk of things deep and high with 
you, but if I once began I should go on and on, and " of writing 
of letters there would be no end." That is a grand passage of 
Hinton's [on music]. I always feel that music means much more 
than just music, born of earth — joy and sorrow, agony and rapture, 
are so mysteriously blended in its glorious magic. 

Lady RusselPs Recollections 

In July, 1883, I went with Agatha to see Dunrozel for the first 
time ... I was simply enchanted — it was love at first sight, 
which only deepened year after year. . . . We had a good 
many pleasant neighbours ; the Tennysons were more than 
pleasant, and welcomed us with the utmost cordiality, and we 
loved them all. 

At that time Professor Tyndall and Louisa ^ were almost the 
only inhabitants of Hindhead. They were not yet in their house, 
but till it was built and furnished lived in their " hut," where they 
used to receive us with the most cheering, as well as cheerful, 
friendliness. 

Lady Russell to Miss Lilian Blyth ^ [_Mrs. Wilfred Praeger] 

Dunrozel, Haslemere, November 16, 1883 

Your letter is just like you, and that means all that is dear and 
good and loving. . . . Indeed, past years are full of happy 
memories of you all, not on marked days only, but on all days. 
At my age, however, it is better to look forward to the renewal of 
all earthly ties and all earth's best joys in an enduring home, than 
to look back to the past — to the days before the blanks were left 
in the earthly home which nothing here below can ever fill, and 
this it is my prayer and my constant endeavour to do. We 
go home to dear Pembroke Lodge next Tuesday . . . going 
there must always be a happiness to us all, yet this lovely little 
Dunrozel is not a place to leave without many a pang. 

' Mrs. Tyndall. 

== Daughter of the Rev. F. C. Blyth, for many years curate at Petersham. 



266 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Lady Russell to Miss Biihler^ 

Pembroke Lodge, December^ 1883 

... I find my head will not bear more than a certain amount 
of writing without giddiness and dull headache . . . and there are 
so many correspondents who must be answered ; friends, relations, 
business people, that I am often quite bewildered ; ... so, please, 
understand that I shall always write when I can, but not nearly 
always when I would like to do so. Go on letting yourself out 
whether sadly or happily, or in mingled sadness and happiness, 
and believe how very much I like to see into your thoughts and 
your heart as much as letters can enable me to do so. . . . As for 
Scotland, oh 1 Scotland, my own, my bonny Scotland ! if you 
associate that best and dearest of countries with your present 
ennui and unhappiness, I shall turn my back upon you for good 
and all and give you up as a bad job ! So make haste and tell me 
that you entirely separate the two things, and if you don't adm.ire 
" mine own romantic town " and feel its beauty thrill through and 
through you, you must find the cause in anything rather than in 
Edinburgh itself ! Such are my commands. ... In the mean- 
time let it be a consolation and a support to you to remember 
that it is by trials and difficulties that our characters are raised, 
developed, strengthened, made more Christ-like. . . . Good-bye, 
good-bye. God bless you. 

Lady Russell to Sir Henry Taylor 

February 29, 1884 
I have just been reading with painful interest '* Memoires d'un 
Protestant condamne aux Galeres " in the days of that terribly 
little great man Louis XIV. I ask myself at every page, " Did man 
really so treat his fellow-man ? or is it all historical nightmare ? " 
I never can make the slightest allowance for persecutors on the 
ground that " they thought it right to persecute." They had no 
business so to think. 

Mr. Gladstone to Lady Russell 

December 14, 1884 
I thank you for and return Dr. Westcott's interesting and 
weighty letter, ... A very clever man, a Bampton lecturer, 
evidently writing with good and upright intention, sends me a 
lecture in which he lays down the qualities he thinks necessary to 
make theological study fruitful. They are courage, patience, and 

' Miss Biihler (who died some years ago) had been governess to Lady 
Russell's grandson Bertrand. She was Swiss, and only nineteen when she 
came,;^and Lady Russell gave her motherly care and affection. 



1878-98] LETTERS FROM GLADSTONE 267 

sympathy. He omits one quality, in my opinion even more 
important than any of them, and that is reverence. Without a 
great stock of reverence mankind, as I beUeve, will go to the 
bad. , . . 

During the strife and heat of the controversy on Home 
Rule, Lady Russell received the following letter from Mr. 
Gladstone : 

10, Downing Street, Whitehall, 

June 10, 1886 
My dear Lady Russell, — I am not less gratified than 
touched by your most acceptable note. It is most kind in you 
personally to give me at a critical time the assurance of your 
sympathy and approval. And I value it as a reflected indication 
of what would, I believe, have been the course, had he been still 
among us, of one who was the truest disciple of Mr. Fox, and was 
like him ever forward in the cause of Ireland, a right handling of 
which he knew lay at the root of all sound and truly Imperial 
poUcy. It was the more kind of you to write at a time when 
domestic trial has been lying heavily upon you. Believe me, 

Very sincerely yours, 

W. E. Gladstone 

Lady Russell to Lady Agatha Russell 

Dunrozel, Haslemere, August 30, 1886 
. . . Our Sunday, mine especially, was a peaceful, lovely 
Sabbath — mine especially because I didn't go to any church built 
with hands, but held my silent, solitary worship in God's own 
glorious temple, with no walls to limit my view, no lower roof than 
the blue heavens over my head. The lawn, the green walk, the 
Sunday bench in the triangle, each and all seemed filled with 
holiness and prayer — sadness and sorrow. Visions of more than 
one beautiful past which those spots have known and which never 
can return, were there too ; but the Eternal Love was around 
to hallow them. . . . 

Lady Russell to Miss Buhler 

Pembroke Lodge, November 24, 1886 
My dearest Dora, — I am afraid you will say that I have 
forgotten you and your most loving and welcome birthday letter, 
but as I know you will not thijik it, I don't so very much mind. 
Nobody at seventy-one and with many still to love and leave on 
earth, can hail a birthday with much gladness. . . . The real sadness 



268 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

to me of birthdays, and of all marked days, is in the bitterly dis- 
appointing answer I am obliged to make to myself to the question : 
" Am I nearer to God than a year ago ?"...! never answered 
your long-ago letter about your doubts and difficulties and specula- 
tions on those subjects which are of deepest import to us all, yet 
upon which it sometimes seems that we are doomed to work our 
minds in vain — to seek, and not to find — to exult one moment in 
the fullness of bright hope and the coming fulfilment of our 
highest aspirations, and the next to grope in darkness and say, 
" Was it not a beautiful dream, and only a dream ? Is 
it not too good to be true that we are the children of a 
loving Father who stretches out His hands to guide us 
to Himself, who has spoken to us in a thousand ways from 
the beginning of the world by His wondrous works, by the 
unity of creation, by the voices of our fellow-creatures, by that 
voice, most inspired of all, that life and death most beautiful and 
glorious of all, which ' brought life and immortality to light, ^ and 
chiefly by that which we feel to be immortal within us — love — 
the beginning and end of God's own nature, the supreme capa- 
bility which He has breathed into our souls ? " No, it is not too 
good to be true. Nothing perishes — not the smallest particle of 
the most worthless material thing. Is immortality denied to the 
one thing most worthy of it ? 

I sent you '* The Utopian," because I thought some of the 
little essays would fall in with all that filled your mind, and 
perhaps help you to a spirit of hopefulness and confidence which will 
come to you and abide with you, I am sure. You will soon receive 
another book written by several Unitarians, of which I have only 
read very little as yet, but which seems to me full of strength and 
comfort and holiness. . . . Good-bye, and God bless you. 

Your ever affectionate, 

F. Russell 

Lady Charlotte Portal to Lady Russell 

January 26, 1887 
Dearest Fanny, — I wonder if you are quite easy in your 
conscience, or whatever mechanism takes the place with you of 
that rococo old article. Do you think you have behaved to me 
as an elder ought ? — to me, a poor young thing, looking for and 
sadly requiring the guidance of my white-headed sister ? Our last 
communications were at Christmas-time — a month ago. Are you 
all well ? Are you all entirely at the feet of the dear baby boy ? 
Or have your republican principles begun to rebel against his 
autocratic sway ? . . . I have been amusing myself with an obscure 
author named William Shakespeare, and enjoying him immensely. 

• Arthur, son of Mr. Rollo Russell. 



1878-98] FAMILY LETTERS 269 

Amusing myself is not the right expression, for I have been in the 
tragedies only. I had not read " Othello " for ages. How wonder- 
ful, great, and beautiful and painful it is (oh dear, why is it so 
coarse ?). Then I also read " Lear" and " Henry VHI," and being 
delightfully ignorant I had the great interest of reading the same 
period (Henry VHI) in Holinshed, and in finding Katharine's and 
Wolsey's speeches there ! Then I have tried a little Ben Jonson 
and Lord Chesterfield's letters. What a worldling, and what a 
destroyer of a young mind that man was. Can you tell me how 
the son turned out ? I cannot find any information about him. 
The language is delightful, and I wish I could remember any of 
his expressions. . . . Now give me a volume of Pembroke Lodge 
news in return for this. Public matters, the fear of war, the 
arming of all nations, make me sick at heart. How wonderful and 
admirable the conduct of that poor friendless little Bulgaria has 
been. Then Ireland, oh me ! but on that topic I won't write to 
the Home Ruler ! 

Your affectionate sister, 

C. M. P. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, 'January 2j^ 1887 
Dearest Lotty, — It was but yesterday that there rose dimly 
to my memory the vision of a lady with the initials — C. M. P., 
and who knows how long I might have remained in the dark as 
to who and what she might be but for this letter, in which she 
claims me as a sister ! and moreover an elder and a wiser sister ! 
one therefore whose doings and not-doings, writing and not- 
writing, must not be questioned by the younger. . . . 

We have imagined ourselves living in a state of isolation from our 
fellow-creatures, but yours far exceeds ours and makes it almost into 
a life of gaiety. I'm most extremely sorry to hear of it, though most 
extremely glad to hear that your minds to you a kingdom are. What 
good and wholesome and delightful ioodyour mind has been living 
on. Isn't that Shakespeare too much of a marvel to have really 
been a man ? "Othello " is indeed all you say of it, and more than 
anybody can say of it, and so are all the great plays. I am reading 
the historical ones with Bertie. . . . Alas, indeed, for the coarse- 
ness ! I never can understand the objections to Bowdlerism. It 
seems to me so right and natural to prune away what can do 
nobody good — what it pains eyes to look upon and ears to hear — 
and to leave all the glories and beauties untouched. . . . The 
little Autocrat is beginning to master some of the maxims of 
Constitutional Monarchy — for instance, to find out that we do 
not always leave the room the moment he waves his hand by 
way of dismissal and utters the command of " Tata." I waste 
too much time upon him, in spite of daily resolutions to neglect 



270 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

him, ... I don't at all know whether Lord Chesterfield suc- 
ceeded in making his son like his own clever, worldly, con- 
temptible self, but will try to find out. Have you read " Dean 
Maitland " ? ^ Now, Fanny, do stop, you know you have many 
other letters to write. . . . 

Ever thine, 

F. R. 
Lady Russell to Lady Georgiana Peel 

DuNROZEL, Haslemere, Surrey, September 9 [1887] 
, . . Your account of the Queen and her visit interested us 
much. ... I often wish she could ever know all my gratitude 
to her and the nation for the unspeakable blessing and happiness 
Pembroke Lodge has been, and is ; joys and sorrows, hopes 
fulfilled, and hopes faded and crushed, chances and changes, and 
memories unnumbered, are sacredly bound up with that dear 
home. Will it ever be loved by others as we have loved it ? It 
seems impossible. . . . 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

DuNROZEL, Haslemere, September 12, 1887 
Dearest Lotty, — I don't think I am writing because your 
clock is on the stroke of Sixty-three, for these clocks of ours 
become obtrusive, and the less they are listened to the better for 
our spirits. I wonder whether it's wrong and unnatural not to 
rejoice in their rapid movements as regards myself. .1 often think 
so. There is so much, or rather there are so many, oh, so many ! 
to go to when it has struck for the last time, and the longing and 
the yearning to be with them is so unspeakable — and yet, dear 
Lotty, I cling to those here, not less and less, but more and more, 
as the time for leaving them draws nearer. God grant you many 
and many another birthday of happiness, as I trust this one is to 
you and your home. . . . Your letter was an echo of much that 
we had been saying to one another, as we read our novel — not 
only does nobody, man or even woman, see every change and 
know its meaning in the human countenance, and interpret rightly 
the slight flush, the hidden tremor, the shade of pallor, the faint 
tinge, etc. ; but we don't think there are perceptible changes 
to such an extent except in novels. ... I think a great evil of 
novels for girls, mingled with great good, is the false expectation 
they raise that somebody will know and understand their every 
thought, look, emotion. . . . How glad I am that you have a rival 
baby to worship — ours is beyond all praise — oh, so comical and 
so lovely in all his little ways and words. . . . 

Your most affectionate sister, 

F. R. 

' " The Silence of Dean Maitland," by Maxwell Gray. 



1878-98] POLITICS AND MORALS 271 

Lady Russell to Lady Georgiana Peel 

Pembroke Lodge, November 28, 1887 
. . . We have been having such a delightful visit from Lotty 
. . . we did talk ; and yet it seems as if all the talk had only made 
me wish for a great deal more. Books and babies and dress and 
almsgiving and amusements and the nineteenth century, its merits 
and its faults, high things and low things, and big things and 
trifles, and sense and nonsense, and everything except Home Rule, 
on which we don't agree and couldn't spare time to fight. We 
did thoroughly agree, however, as I think people of all parties 
must have done, in admiration of a lecture, or rather speech, made 
at our school by a very good and clever Mr. Wicksteed, a Non- 
conformist (I believe Unitarian) minister on Politics and Morals. 
The principle on which he founded it was that politics are a 
branch of morals ; accordingly he placed them on as high a level 
as any other duty of life, and spoke with withering indignation of 
the too common practice, and even theory, that a little insincerity, 
a little trickery, is allowable in politics, whereas it would not be 
in other matters.^ We were all delighted. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, March 7, 1888 
" Adam Bede " was as interesting a sofa companion as you 
could have found ; a very lovely book — wit and pathos almost 
equally good, pathos quite the best though, to my mind. We are 
reading aloud another charming book of Lowell's, " Democracy," 
and other essays in the same volume ; and I flutter about from 
book to book by myself, and have still two books of '* Paradise 
Lost " to read, and am wondering what is going to happen 
to Adam and Eve. I was very miserable when I found she 
ate the forbidden fruit. She had made such fair promises to 
be good. Alas, alas ! why did she break them ? That story of the 
Fall, though I suppose nobody thinks it verbally true, is always to 
me most full of deep meaning, and seems to be the story of every 
mortal man and woman born into this wondrous world. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

DuNROZEL, Haslemere, October 3, i888 

Agatha gone yesterday to Pembroke Lodge — RoUo gone 

to-day to join her, so my wee bairnie and I are 'Meft by our 

lone," as you used to say. " Einsam nein, dass bin ich nicht, 

denn die Geister meiner Lieben, Sie umschweben mich."^' I 

^ Lady Russell often quoted a saying attributed to Fox, "Nothing 
which is morally wrong can ever be politically right." 

' "Lonely — no, that am I not, for the spirits of my loved ones, they 
hover around me." 



272 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

think it's good now and then to let the blessed and beautiful 
memories of the past have their way and float in waking dreams 
before our eyes, and not be forced down beneath daily duties and 
occupations and enjoyments, till the pain of keeping them there 
becomes hard to bear. Yet, " act, act in the living present " 
is very, very much the rightest thing ; though I don't think 
I quite like the past to be called the dead past, when it is 
so fearfully full of keenest life. 

Lady Russell to Lady Georgiana Peel 

DuNROZEL, Haslemere, Surrey, October 8, 1888 
. . . We have had RoUo's old Oxford friend, Dr. Drewitt, here 
for two nights — the very cheerfulest of guests. He is head of the 
Victoria Hospital for Children, and what with keen interest in his 
profession, and intense love of nature, animate and inanimate, I 
don't think he would know how to be bored. Hard-worked men 
have far the best of it here below, although we are accustomed to 
look upon " men of leisure " as those to be envied ; but how seldom 
one finds a man or woman, who lives a life in earnest, and who 
has eyes to see and observe, taking a gloomy view of human 
nature and its destinies. I wonder what you have been reading ? 
I have taken up lately that delightful book, Lockhart's " Life 
of Sir Walter Scott," and dipping into many besides. . . . Some 
of our pleasantest neighbours have paid us good-bye visits ; 
Frederic Harrisons, and the charming and wonderful old Miss 
Swanwick.^ ... 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, March 13, 1889 
How could you, could you, could you think that my mental vow 
not to write on the all-absorbing political catastrophe was because 
I sing "God save Ireland " in one sense, and you in another ! 
The vow was made because if once the flood-gates of my 
eloquence are let loose on that subject, there is a danger that the 
stream will Tennysonially "go on for ever." It is, however, a vow 
made to be broken from time to time, when I allow a httle ripple 
to flow a little way and make a little noise, and then return to the 
usual attitude towards non-sympathizers ; and, like David, keep 
silence and refrain even from good words, though it is pain and 
grief to me, and my heart is hot within me. I am speaking of 
the mere acquaintance non-sympathizers, or those known to be 
too bitter to bear difference of opinion ; but don't be afraid, 
or do be afraid, as you may put it, and be prepared for total 

' Miss Anna Swanwick. 



1878-98] MEMORIES OF MINTO 273 

removal of the flood-gates when you come. Don't you often 
feel yourself in David's trying condition, knowing that your words 
would be very good, yet had better not be spoken ? I don't like 
it at all. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

DuNROZEL, September 4, 1889 
Dearest Lotty, — It was nice to hear from you from Minto. 
What a strange sensation it always gives me to write or to hear 
that word of Minto.^ I am sure you know it too — impossible to 
define, but like something beautiful and holy, not belonging to this 
world. I like to hope that such memories have been stored up by 
the younger spirits who have succeeded us, while " children not 
hers have trod our nursery floor." But in this restless, fly-about 
age can they ever be quite the same ? . . . I see that luckily I 
have no room to go on about lovely, lovable, sorrowful Ireland. 
Alas ! that England has ever had anything to do with her ; 
but better times are coming, and she will be understood by 
her conquerors at last, and be the better for them. Hush ! 
Fanny, no more ; even that is too much. God bless thee. 

Ever thine, 

F. R. 

In 1889 the " Life of Lord John Russell " by Mr. Spencer 
Walpole, was published. 

Mr. Gladstone to Lady Russell 

Hawarden Castle, Chester, October 30, 1889 
My dear Lady Russell, — The week which has elapsed since 
I received from Mr. Walpole's kindness a copy of his biography 
has been with me a busy one ; but I have now completed a careful 
perusal of the first volume. I cannot help writing to congratulate 
you on its appearance. It presents a beautiful and a noble picture. 
Having so long admired and loved your husband (and the political 
characters which attract love are not very numerous), I now, with 
the fuller knowledge of an early period which this volume gives 
me, both admire and love him more. Your own personal share 
in the delineation is enviable. And the biographer more than 
vindicates the wisdom of your choice ; his work is capital, but it 

' Lady Russell had written in 1857 to her father about Minto : " I can 
well imagine the loveliness of that loveliest and dearest of places. There 
is now to us all a holy beauty in every tree and flower, in rock and river 
and hill that ought to do us good." Later, in a letter to her sister, Lady 
Elizabeth Romilly, she writes of "the Minto of old days, that happiest and 
most perfect home that children ever had." 

T 



274 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

could not have been achieved except with material of the first 
order. O for his aid in the present struggle, vi^hich, however, is 
proceeding to our heart's content. Believe me always most 
sincerely yours, 

W. E. Gladstone 

A little later Mr. Gladstone sent Lady Russell a proof copy 
of an article by him on the Melbourne Ministry,^ from which 
the following passages are here quoted : 

. . . He [Lord John Russell] brought into public life, and he 
carried through it unimpaired, the qualities which ennoble man- 
hood — truth, justice, fortitude, self-denial, a fund of genuine indig- 
nation against wrong, and an inexhaustible sympathy with human 
suffering. . . . With a slender store of physical power, his life was 
a daily assertion of the superiority of the spirit to the flesh. With 
the warmest domestic affections, and the keen susceptibilities of 
sufferings they entail, he never failed to rally under sorrow to the 
call of public duty. There were no bounds to the prowess or the 
fellow-feeling with which he would fling himself into the breach 
on behalf of a belaboured colleague ; . . . in 1852 an attack upon 
Lord Clarendon's conduct as Viceroy of Ireland stirred all the 
depths of his nature, and he replied in a series of the noblest 
fighting passages which I have ever heard spoken in Parliament 
... At the head of all these qualities stands the moral element. 
I do not recollect or know the time in our own history when the 
two great parties in the House of Commons have been led by men 
who so truly and so largely as Lord John Russell and Sir Robert 
Peel identified political with personal morality. 

W. E. Gladstone 

Lady Charlotte Portal to Lady Russell, after reading Mr. Walpole's 
" Life of Lord John Russell " 

December 26, 1889 

... I long that every one should know as we do what the 
extraordinary beauty of that daily life was. I always think it was 
the most perfect man's life that I ever knew of ; and that could 
better bear the full flood of light than any other. 

In January, 1890, after nearly twelve years' break in her 
diary, Lady Russell began writing again a few words of daily 
record. On the 6th she mentions a " most agreeable " visit 

' Nineteenth Century, Jan ry, 1890. 



1878-98] LEADERSHIP OF PARNELL 275 

from Mr. Froude ; the same day she received Mr. Justin 
McCarthy to dinner, and adds that the talk was " more 
Shakespeare than Ireland." 

Lady Russell to Mr. Justin McCarthy ^ 

November 19, 1890 

Dear Mr. McCarthy, — I hardly know why I write to you, 
but this terrible sin and terrible verdict make us very, very 
unhappy, and we think constantly of you, who have been 
among his closest friends, and of all who have trusted him 
and refused to believe in the charge against him. You must, 
I know, be feeling all the keenness and bitterness of sorrow 
in the moral downfall of a man whose claims to the gratitude 
and admiration of his country in his public career nothing 
can cancel. It is also much to be feared that the great cause 
will suffer, at least in England, if he retains the leadership. It 
ought not, of course ; but where enthusiasm and even respect 
for the leader can no longer be felt, there is danger of diminution 
of zeal for the cause. Were he to take the honourable course, 
which alone would show a sense of shame — that of resignation — 
his political enemies would be silenced, and his friends would feel 
that although reparation for the past is impossible, he has not been 
blinded by long continuance in deception and sin to his own 
unworthiness, and to the fact that his word can no longer be 
trusted as it has been, and as that of a leader ought to be. I dare 
not think of what his own state of mind must be ; it makes me so 
miserable — the unlimited trust of a nation not only in his political 
but in his moral worth must be like a dagger in his heart. Were 
he to retire, the recollection of the great qualities he has shown 
would revive, and the proof of remorse given by his retirement 
would draw a veil over his guilt, and the charity, which we all 
need, would not be withheld from him. I know that numerous 
instances can be given of men in the highest positions who have 
retained them without opposition in spite of lives tainted with 
similar sin ; but this has not been without evil to the nation, 
and I think there is a stronger sense now than there used 
to be of the value of high private character in public men, in spite 
of a great deal of remaining Pharisaism in the difference of the 
measure of condemnation meted out to different men. I think too 
that the unusual and most painful amount of low deception in this 
case will be felt, even more than the sin itself, by the English 
people. Pray forgive me, dear Mr. McCarthy, for writing on this 
sad topic ; but I have got into the habit of writing and speaking 

' Written after the Parnell O'Shea divorce case. 



276 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

freely to you, even when it can, as now, do no earthly good to 
anybody. 

There is one consolation in the thought that should he retire 
Ireland is not wanting in the best and highest to succeed him. 
Pray do not write if you prefer not, though I long to hear from 
you, or still better see you. 

Yours most sincerely, 

F. Russell 

Lady Russell to Mr. Justin McCarthy 

Pembroke Lodge, November 22, 1890 
Dear Mr. McCarthy, — I cannot rest without telling you how 
very sorry I shall be if my letter gave you one moment's pain. 
I knew how close and true a friend you were of Mr. Parnell, and 
how unchanging your friendship would be ; but I did not know 
which course that unchanging friendship would lead you to take. 
Not a doubt can ever cross our minds of the patriotism which has 
dictated your action and that of your Irish colleagues. Do not 
allow any doubt to cross yours or theirs, that it is the intensity 
of love for the great cause which led many in England to wish 
for a different decision. Nothing would be more terrible, more 
fatal, than any coldness between the friends of Ireland on the two 
sides of the Channel. May God avert such a misfortune, and 
whatever happens, believe me always most sincerely yours, 

F. Russell 

Mr. Justin McCarthy to Lady Russell 

November 24, 1890 
Dear Lady Russell, — I ought to have answered your kind letter 
before, for I value your sympathy more — much more — than I can 
tell you in words. I am afraid the prospect is dark for the 
present. Mr. Gladstone sent for me to-day and I had some talk 
with him. He was full of generous consideration and kindness, but 
he thinks there will be a catastrophe for the cause if Parnell does 
not retire. The Irish members cannot and would not throw over 
Parnell, but he may even yet decide upon retiring. All depends 
on to-morrow, and we have not seen him. I have the utmost 
faith in his singleness of public purpose and his judgment and 
policy, but it is a terrible crisis. 

With kindest regards, very truly yours, 

Justin McCarthy 

Lady Russell to Mrs. Warburton 

Pembroke Lodge, November 22, 1890 
My dearest Isabel, — . . . Yes, dearie, it was a delightful 
visit, leaving delightful memories of all kinds ; chats gay and grave, 



1878-98] MICHAEL DAVITT 277 

trots long and short, drives, duets — will they ever come again ? I 
am very glad this heart-breaking Irish thunderclap did not fall 
vifhile you were here. It makes us so unhappy. Poor Ireland ! her 
hopes are always dashed when about to be fulfilled. Nothing can 
palliate the fearful sin and almost more fearful course of miserable 
deception ; but he might, by taking the one right and honourable 
course of resigning his leadership — if only for a time — at least 
have given a proof of shame, and have saved England and Ireland 
from the terrible pain of discussion and disagreement, and from 
the danger to Home Rule which his retention of the post must 
cause. His Parliamentary colleagues have done immense harm by 
their loud protestations in his favour. There is much to excuse 
them, but not him, for this course. Our poor Davitt is miserable, 
and is braving a storm of unpopularity by writing strongly against 
his (Parnell's) retention of the leadership. His whole thought is 
for Ireland, and he knows that his advice is that of a true friend 
to her — as well as to the wretched man himself. . . . 

Your ever affectionate, 

Mama 

Mr. Michael Davitt had taken a house in Richmond, and 
was living there at this time. Some years earlier Lady 
Russell had read his " Prison Diary," and had written the 
following poem. She did not know him at that time. 

Written after reading Michael Davitt' s " Leaves from a 
Prison Diary " 

DuNROZEL, September, 1887 

Man's justice is not Thine, O God, his scales 
Uneven hang, while he with padlocked heart 
Some glittering shred of human tinsel sees 
Outweigh the pure bright gold of noblest souls, 
Who from the mists of earth their eyes uplift 
And seek to read Thy message in the stars. 

Thou hearest, Lord, beneath the felon's garb 

The lonely throbbing of no felon's heart, 

The cry of agony — the prayer of love 

By agony unconquered — love, heaven-born, 

That fills with holy light the joyless cell. 

As with the daybreak of his prayer fulfilled, 

The glorious dawn of brotherhood for man, 

And freedom to the sorrowing land that bore him, 

For whose dear sake he smiles upon his chains. 



278 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Thou gatherest, Lord, his bitter nightly tears 
For home, for face beloved and trusted hand, 
For the green earth, the freshly blowing breeze, 
The heaven of Liberty, all, all shut out. 



His vanished dreams, his withered hopes Thou knowest, 

The baffled yearnings of his heart to snatch 

From paths unhallowed childhood's tottering feet, 

And lay a rosy smile on little lips 

With homeless hunger pale, to curses trained. 

Whereon no kiss hath left a memory sweet. 

His chainless spirit, bruised by prison bars, 
Wounded by touch of fellow-men in whom 
Thy image lost he vainly sought, Thou seest 
Unsullied still, lord of its own domain. 
Soar in its own blue sky of faith and hope. 

Such have there been and such there yet will be, 
From whom the world's hard eye is turned in scorn, 
But still for each a nation's tears will fall, 
A nation's heart will be his earthly haven, 
And when no earthly stay he needeth more, 
Will he not. Father, feel Thy love enfold him. 
And hear Thy voice, " Servant of God, well done." 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, November 26, 1890 

Alas ! alas ! the last fortnight has indeed been one of darkness 
and sorrow over the country ; railway and ocean horrors breaking 
many hundreds of hearts, disgrace to England in Africa, disgrace 
to a trusted leader dashing down the hopes of Ireland and bringing 
back disunion between the two nations. We made ourselves 
miserable over last night's news of the determination of his 
parliamentary followers to stand by him, and his acceptance 
of their re-election. Poor old Gladstone ! I am sure you must 
admire his letter to Mr. Morley. To-day we are told to have 
a little hope that it may have influence in the right direction, but 
we hardly feel any. We heartily agree with every word you say 
on this most painful matter. The one consolation is to see such 
an increase of opinion that a leader must be a man of high private, 
as well as public, character. How often I have deplored the 
absence of any such opinion ! 



1878--98] ENGLAND AND IRELAND 279 

Lady Russell to Mr. Justin McCarthy 

Pembroke 'Loug'e, November 2*], 1890 

Dear Mr. McCarthy, — Your most kind letter was a relief to 
me as regarded the spirit in which you had taken what I wrote, 
but also made us very, very sad, and nothing that we have heard 
or read in newspapers since has given more than a mere ray of 
hope. And why should this be ? Surely the path of honour and 
duty is plain. It cannot be taken without pain ; but such moments 
as this are the test of greatness in men and nations. Gratitude un- 
told is due to Mr. Parnell. Those who have been his friends will 
not withdraw their friendship ; but surely that very friendship 
ought to resolve that the vast good he has done in the past 
should not be undone for the future, to his own eternal discredit, 
by encouragement to him to retain the leadership. Surely the 
claims of your country stand first ; and is not the impending breach 
between English and Irish Home Rulers a misfortune to both 
countries, too terrible to be calmly faced ? Already there is a tone 
in the Freeman's Journal which I could not have believed would 
be adopted towards men like Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Morley, who 
have identified themselves heart and soul with Ireland. Of course, 
they are far above bv ""g turned for a moment from their course by 
any such comments, but it must be a pain to them nevertheless. 
It almost seems aberration of mind in Mr. Parnell to be deaf to 
Mr. Gladstone's words of true patriotism, echoed as they are 
throughout England and Scotland, and I cannot but believe in 
thousands of Irish hearts besides. Surely this must have gone far 
to convince his friends that they would be more than justified in 
convincing him that retirement for awhile is his duty, or, if they 
cannot convince him, in acting upon their own convictions, if these 
are such as I hope. Indignation against the terrible revelations of 
his guilt has driven some English newspapers into language deeply 
to be deplored ; but on the whole the feeling, as shown in speeches 
and in the Press, has been healthy and just. Sir Charles Russell's 
words struck us as among the very best. It is the deepest and 
highest love for Ireland that makes men speak and write as they do. 

Dear Mr. McCarthy, I think you can do much, and I know 
how firm, as well as how gentle, it is your nature to be. Save us 
all, for God's sake, from the dreaded disunion and the ruin of the 
cause. Do not let England and Ireland be again looked upon as 
separated in their hopes, interests, aspirations. May Mr. Dillon 
and Mr. O'Brien help to the good work ; but too much can hardly 
depend on men at a distance, excellent and patriotic as they are. 

Good-bye, dear Mr. McCarthy. May God guide and! unite our 
two countries on the road of justice and truth and happiness. 
Pray, pray forgive me once more for writing. 

Ever most sincerely yours, 

F. Russell 



28o LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

In 1891 Mr. Rollo Russell married Miss Gertrude Joachim, 
niece of the great violinist, Dr. Joachim, and Lady Russell 
found new joy in his happiness. 



Queen Victoria to Lady Russell 

January i, 1891 

Dear Lady Russell, — You are indeed right in thinking that 
I should always take an interest in anything that concerned you 
and your family, and I rejoice to hear that your son is going 
to make a marriage which gives you pleasure, and trust it may 
conduce to your comfort as well as to his happiness. It is 
a long time since I have had the pleasure of seeing you, dear 
Lady Russell, and I trust that some day this may be possible. 
Past days can never be forgotten — indeed, one loves to dwell 
on them, though the thought is mingled with sadness. Pray 
remember me to Agatha, and believe me always, 

Yours affectionately, 

V. R. L 

Lady Russell to Mr. Rollo Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, January 14, 1892 

. . . Most truly do you say that, while we can shelter ourselves 
from the demands that assail our physical being, no defence has 
been found against the bitter blasts which batter against our mental 
and spiritual structure — no defence, only endurance, in hope and 
faith and endeavour after Marcus Aurelius's '* Equanimitas," and 
the knowledge that the higher man's mental and moral capacity 
the greater is his capacity for suffering. . . . And nobody has 
shown more than you do in " Psalms of the West " that sorrow is 
is not all sorrow, but has a heavenly sacredness that gives strength 
to bear its burden ** in quietness and confidence" to the end. How 
entirely I feel with you that this has been a glorious century. Not 
all the evil and the misery and the vice and the meanness and 
pettinesses which abound on every side, as we look around, can 
blind me to the blessed truth that the eyes of mankind have been 
opening to see and to deplore these things, and to give their lives 
to the study of their causes, and the discovery and practice of 
means to put an end to them. The wonderful intellectual strides, 
which my long life enables me not only to be aware of, but to 
remember as they have one by one been made, are in close con- 
nection with this moral and religious development ; and all these 
together will, I believe, raise the education of the people (already 
so far above the standard of fifty, much more of a hundred years 
ago) to something of the kind to which you look forward — " more 



1878-98] DEATH OF TENNYSON 281 

high, more wide, more various, more poetic, more inspiring, more 
full of principles and less full of facts " — a consummation devoutly 
to be wished. 



Pembroke Lodge, J^ime 22, 1892 

Day of much weakness. The sense of failing increases rapidly. 
May the short time that remains to me make me less unfit to meet 
my God. Oh, that I could begin life again ! How different it 
would be from what has been. I have had everything to help me 
upward ; joys and sorrows, encouragement and disappointment, 
the love and example of my dearest husband and children in our 
daily companionship and communion, the never-failing and precious 
affection and help of brothers, sisters, and friends — and yet my life 
seems all a failure when I think what it might have been. 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

The Grange, Hindhead, Haslemere, ^uly 20, 1892 

Yes, elections are hard tests of character, and there are too, too 
many excellent people on both sides who are led on to say hard, 
unjust, untrue things of their opponents. . . . But there is another 
side to elections — a grand and noble one — which makes me feel 
to my inmost soul the greatness and the blessed freedom of this 
dear old country, and always brings to my mind what John used 
to say with something of a boy's enthusiasm, " I love a contested 
election." 

The Grange, Hindhead, October 6, 1892 

Tennyson died about one o'clock a.m. A great and good light 
extinguished. 

October yth 

Agatha and I early to Aid worth. Went in by Hallam's wish 
to the room where he lay. I dread and shrink from the sight of 
death, and wish to keep the recollection of the life I have known 
and loved undisturbed by its soulless image. But in this case I 
rejoice to have seen on that noble face the perfect peace which of 
late years was wanting — it was really " the rapture of repose." A 
volume of Shakespeare which he had asked for, and the leaves of 
which he had turned over yesterday, I believe to find *' Cymbeline," 
at which place it was open, lay on the bed. His hands were 
crossed on his breast, beautiful autumn leaves lay strewn around 
him on the coverlet, and white flowers at the foot of the bed. 



282 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Lady Russell to Lady Charlotte Portal 

Pembroke Lodge, Novembet 2, 1892 

Oh, Lotty, how is it that, standing as I am on the very brink of 
the known, with the unknown about to sweep me into its depths, 
how is it that there is still such intense interest in the course of 
this wondrous world, in all the problems now floating about 
unsolved, in all the social, moral, political work going on around 
us. It is true that these things are of eternal moment, and there- 
fore links between earth and heaven. Yet it often seems to me 
foolish to care about them very much when the solution of all 
enigmas is so near at hand. 

Lady Russell to Mrs. Rollo Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, March 17, 1893 

. , . The chief Pembroke Lodge event since I wrote is that I 
went on Monday to Windsor Castle to luncheon ; after which 
morning meal with the household, almost all strangers to me, I 
saw the Queen alone and had a good long and most easy and 
pleasant conversation with her. She was as cordial as possible, 
and I am very glad to have seen her again ; although there was 
much sadness mingled with the gladness in a meeting after a 
period of many, many years, which had brought their full number 
of changes to me — and some to her. 

Lady Russell to Mt. Rollo Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, Richmond, Surrey, J^uly 7, 1893 

I feel intensely all you say about laying aside, if it were 
possible, one's own personality and seeing the silent growth of all 
truth and goodness, without the disturbance of names and parties ; 
but the world being as it is for the present, we can only keep our 
minds fixed on the good and the true, with whomsoever and with 
whatsoever party we may find it, and follow it with honest con- 
viction. If I could, I would put an end to Party Government 
to-morrow, and my great wish for M.P.'s is that each one should, 
upon each subject, vote exactly according to his opinion, and no 
Ministry be turned out except upon a vote of want of confidence. 
I honour and love Mr. Gladstone, and while ardently sympathetic 
with him on Home Rule and all other Liberal measures, I am no 
less antipathetic on Church matters. Happily, however, they have 
become with him matters chiefly of personal attachment to 
Anglicanism, and no longer (I believe) likely to affect his legisla- 
tion. " Gladstonian " is a word he does not admit, nor do those 
of whom it is used. 



1878-98] HOME RULE 283 

y^ulyg, 1893. — Well, to go on with our politics : " a new policy " 
Home Rule undoubtedly is, a new departure from the "tradition " of 
any English party ; but not a departure from Liberal principles, only 
a new application of old ones, and I think it is a pity to speak of 
it as being against Liberal principles, for is there anybody of 
average intelHgence who would not have predicted that if it 
should ever be adopted by any party it would be by the Liberals ? 
Exactly the same thing was said about Turkey : the Whig tradi- 
tion was to support her, Liberals were forsaking their principles 
by taking part with Bulgaria against her. It is the proud distinc- 
tion of Liberals to grow perpetually, and to march on with eyes 
open, and to discover, as they are pretty sure to do, that they have 
not always in the past been true to their principles. There is no 
case exactly parallel with that of Ireland ; but there are some in 
great measure analogous, and it is the Liberals who have listened 
to the voice of other countries, some of them our own dependen- 
cies, in their national aspirations or their desire for Parliaments of 
their own, expressed by Constitutional majorities. I admire the 
Unionists for standing by their own convictions with regard to 
Home Rule, and always have done so ; but I cannot call it *' devo- 
tion to the Union and to Liberal principles," and I am not aware 
of there being a single Home Ruler not a Liberal. The Unionists, 
especially those in Parliament, have been, and are, in a very 
dangerous position, and have yielded too readily to the temptation 
of a sudden transference of party loyalty upon almost every ques- 
tion from Liberal to Tory leaders. But for those, whether in or 
out of Parliament, who have remained Liberals — and I know 
several such — I don't see why, after Home Rule is carried, they 
should not be once more merged in the great body of Liberals, 
and have their chances, like others, of being chosen to serve their 
country in Parliament and in office. . . , 

I am reading a book by Grant Allen, " Science in Arcady." 
. . . He brings wit and originality into these essays on plants, 
lakes, spiders, etc. 



Lady Russell to Lady Agatha Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, September 22, 1893 

. . . With regard to the modern attraction of ugly subjects 
{not when the wish to remedy gross evils makes it a duty to study 
and live among them ; but as common talk between young men and 
young women), I feel very strongly that the contemplation of God, 
and all that is God-like in the souls that He has created, is our 
best safeguard against evil, and that the contemplation of the spirit 
of evil, and all the hideous variety of its works, gradually taints us 
and weakens our powers of resistance. 



284 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

Lady Russell to Lady Agatha Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, October 21, 1893 
... I entirely agree with you, that poetry and music " teach 
us of the things that are unseen " as nothing else can do. Music 
especially, which is an unseen thing, not the product of man 
at all, but found from man as a gift from God's own hand. 
I don't know what at some periods of my life I should have 
done without these blessed sympathizers and outlets and up- 
lifting friends. 

Lady Russell to Mrs. Drummond 

Pembroke Lodge, December 16, 1893 
Your long interesting letter is most welcome. You are very 
good and brave to do so much for the good of others, while 
suffering yourself. How much harder it is to bear patiently, and 
keep up sympathy and fellow-feeling within us in spite of illness, 
than to do any amount of active work while in health. I ahvays 
find my highest examples in those who know how to " suffer and 
be strong," because it is my own greatest difficulty. 

Oh, my dear child, what opinions can poor I give on the almost 
insoluble problems you put before me ? I wish I knew of any 
book or any man or woman who could tell me whether a Poor 
Law, even the very best, is on the whole a blessing or a curse, and 
how the " unemployed " can be chosen out for work of any useful 
or productive kind without injury to others equally deserving, and 
what are the just limits of State interference with personal liberty. 
The House of Lords puzzles me less. I would simply declare it, 
by Act of the House of Commons, injurious to the best interests of 
the nation and for ever dissolved. Then it may either show its 
attachment to the Constitution by giving its assent to its own 
annihilation, or oblige us to break through the worn-out Con- 
stitution and declare their assent unnecessary. It is beyond all 
bearing that one great measure after another should be delayed, 
or mutilated, year after year, by such a body, and I chafe and fret 
inwardly to a painful degree. Oh for a long talk with you ! I 
will not despair of going to you, " gin I be spared " till the days 
are reasonably long. 

Lady Russell to Lady Agatha Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, October 10, 1894 

. . . Alas ! for our dear Oliver Wendell Holmes ! He has left 

the world much the poorer by his death, but much the richer by 

his life and works. . . . Lord Grey gone too, and with him what 

recollections of my young days, before and after marriage, when 



1878-98J ARMENIAN REFUGEES 285 

he and Lady Grey and we were very much together. We loved 
them both. He was a very trying pohtical colleague to your 
father and others, but a very faithful friend. The longer I live 
the more firmly I am convinced that in most cases to know 
people well is to like them — to forget their faults in their merits. 
But no doubt it is delightful to have no faults to forget. 

Pembroke Lodge, March 3, 1894 

Touching accounts of meeting of the Cabinet — the last with 
dear noble old Gladstone as Minister. Tears in the eyes of his 
colleagues. He made his last speech as Minister in the House 
of Commons, a grand and stirring one. 

Pembroke Lodge, January 23, 1895 

Finished " Erasmus " a few days ago — a great intellect, much 
wit, clear insight into the religion " falsely so-called " of monks 
and clergy, but a soul not great enough to utter his convictions 
aloud in the face of danger, or to perceive that conciliation 
beginning by hypocrisy must end in worse strife and bitterness. 
He saw the evil of the new dogmas and creeds introduced by 
Luther, of any new creed the rejection of which was penal, but he 
did not or would not see the similar evil of the legally enforced 
old creeds and dogmas. 

Pembroke Lodge, May 15, 1895 

Armenian refugees here to tea — a husband and wife whose 
baby she had seen murdered by Turkish soldiers, and a friend who 
is uncertain whether his wife is alive or murdered — these three 
in native dress ; hers very picturesque, and she herself beauti- 
ful. The three refugees, all of whom had been eye-witnesses 
of massacres of relations, looked intensely sad. She gave an 
account of some of the hardships they had suffered, but neither 
they nor we could have borne details of the atrocities. What they 
chiefly wished to express, and did express, was deep gratitude for 
the sympathy of our country, veneration for the memory of John 
as a friend of the Christian subjects of the Sultan, and thanks to 
ourselves. . . . They kissed our hands repeatedly, and the expres- 
sion of their countenances as they looked at us, though without 
words, was very touching. 

Pembroke Lodge, February 24, 1896 

Visit from Mr. Voysey, earnest, interesting, and pathetic in 
accounts of Whitechapel experiences. His Theism fills him with 
the joy of unbounded faith in a perfect God ; but his keen sense 



286 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

of the evil done by the worship of Jesus as another and equal God 
leads him to a painful blindness to that divine character and 
teaching. 

Pembroke Lodge, August 5, 1897 

Sinclair ' has been reading a great deal to me since my illness 
began. Miss Austen's " Emma," which kept its high ground with 
me although I had read it too often to find much novelty in the 
marvellous humour and reality of the characters. Then *' Scenes 
of Clerical Life" . . . the contrast between the minds and the 
brain- work of Jane Austen and George Eliot very striking. Jane 
Austen all ease and spontaneousness and simplicity, George Eliot 
wonderful in strength and passion, and fond of probing the depths 
of human anguish, but often ponderous in long-drawn philosophy 
and metaphysics, and with a tediously cynical and flippant tone 
underlying her portraits of human beings — and a wearisome linger- 
ing over uninteresting details. Her defects are, I think, far more 
prominent in this than in her best later books. 

In the summer of 1897 she had a severe illness, from 
which, as the following letter shows, she partially 
recovered. 

Mrs. Warhurton to Lady Agatha Russell 

Pembroke Lodge, October 11, 1897 
You can't imagine, or rather you can, what a happiness it is to 
be able to record a perfect drive round the Park again with Mama 
this most beautiful day, she enjoying it as of yore, and as full of 
pleasure and observation as I ever remember. In short, it is quite 
difficult to me to realize how ill she has been since I saw her in 
June. She seems and looks so well. She is a marvellous person, 
so young and fresh in all her interests, sight and hearing betraying 
so little sign of change. She says she is out of practice, and her 
playing is not as easy or as vigorous as it was, I thought; but how 
few people of her age would return to it at all after such a long 
illness. (There are the sounds of music overhead as I sit here in 
the drawing-room — how she enjoys it !) . . . About the reading — 
Dr. Gardiner = was against her being prevented from a little — she 
enjoys it so much. Sinclair reading to her is a great comfort. 

' "While in Norfolk Street (in 1882) engaged Sinclair, my good and 
faithful Sinclair, as maid and housekeeper " {Recollections). She remained 
with Lady Russell till her death, and served her with devotion to 
the end. 

* Medical attendant and valued friend for over twelve years, partner 
to Dr. Anderson, of Richmond, with whom he attended Lady Russell 
till her death. 



1878-98] ILLNESS AND DEATH 287 

Pembroke Lodge, November 15, 1897 

Eighty-two this day. God be praised for all he has given to 
brighten my old age. God be praised that I am still able to love, 
to think, to rejoice, and to mourn with those dear to me. But the 
burden of wasted years of a long life, in which I see failure on 
every side, is weighty and painful, and can never be lightened. I 
can only pray that the few steps left to me to take may be on a 
holier path — the narrow path that leads to God. My own blessings 
only brought more vividly to my mind the masses of toiling, 
struggling, poverty-stricken fellow- creatures, from whom the 
pressure of want shuts out the light of life. 

My Agatha well, weather beautiful, and seventy very happy 
boys and girls from the school to see a ventriloquist and his acting 
dolls (drawing-room cleared for the occasion). The children's 
bursts and shouts of laughter delightful to hear. 

Lady Russell was wonderfully well that day — her last birth- 
day on earth — and joined in the fun and laughter as heartily 
as any of the children. Old age had not lessened her keen 
enjoyment of humour, nor dimmed the brightness of her brave 
spirit. 

Pembroke Lodge, December 11, 1897 

A beautiful day for old scholars' meeting. Ninety-four came, a 
larger number than ever before ; table spread in drawing-room 
and bow-room. Not able to go down to see them, but all went 
well and merrily. I was able to get to my sitting-room in the 
afternoon, and all came up to me by turns for a hand-shake. It 
was pleasant to see so many kindly, happy faces. 

Pembroke Lodge, January i, 1898 

What will 1898 bring of joy or sorrow, good or evil, life or 
death, to our home, our country, the world ? May we be ready 
for all, whatever it may be. 

Six days later she was attacked by influenza, which turned 
to bronchitis, and very soon she became seriously ill. There 
was for one day a slight hope that she might recover, but 
the rally was only temporary, and soon it was certain that 
death was near. 

The last book that her daughter had been reading to her 
was the " Life of Tennyson," by his son, which she very much 



288 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1878-98 

enjoyed. She begged her daughter to go on reading it to 
her in the last days of her life, and her keen interest in it was 
wonderful, even when she was too ill to listen to more than a 
few sentences at a time. 

For some years Lady Russell had found great amusement 
and delight in the visits of a little wild squirrel — squirrels 
abounded among the old trees at Pembroke Lodge — which 
gradually became more and more tame and friendly. It used 
to climb up to her windows by a lilac-bush or a climbing rose- 
tree and look brightly in at her while enjoying the nuts she gave 
it on the window-sill. Before long it became very venturesome, 
and would enter the room daily and frisk about, or sit on her 
writing-table or on the tea-table in perfect content, taking food 
from her hand. On the last day of her life the doctor ^ 
was sitting by her bedside when suddenly he noticed the 
beautiful little squirrel bounding in at her window. It 
was only a few hours before she died, but her face lighted up 
at once, and she welcomed her faithful little friend, for the 
last time, with her brightest smile. 

During her illness she had spoken confidently of recovery, 
but the night before her death she realized quite clearly that 
the end was near. Her son and daughter were with her; 
and just before she sank into a last sleep she spoke, in a firm 
clear voice, words of love and faith. Her mind had remained 
unclouded, and her end was as calm and peaceful as those 
who loved her could have wished. She died on January 17, 
1898. 

' Dr. Anderson, who had been for nearly thirty years a true and 
devoted friend. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE immense number of letters received by Lady 
Russell's son and daughter, from men and women of 
ail classes and creeds, bore striking testimony to the wide- 
spread and reverent devotion felt for her memory. Only 
very few selections will be given here. The first letter — 
written on the day of her death — is from Mr. Farrington, 
the respected minister of the Richmond Free Church, who 
had known Lady Russell intimately for many years. 

Rev. Silas Farrington to Lady Agatha Russell 

January 17, 1898 
To me your mother has become more and more an inspiration 
— a kind of tower of cheerful courage and strength. By her stead- 
fast mental and moral bravery, by the sunshine she has been 
beneath the heavy clouds that have been sweeping over her, she 
has made one ashamed of the small things that troubled him and 
rebuked his petty discontent and repining. No one can ever be 
told how much I both have honoured and loved her for the very 
greatness of her noble spirit. 

Rev. Stopford A. Brooke to Lady Agatha Russell 

January 18, 1898 
How little I thought when I saw Lady Russell last ' that I 
should see her no more ! She looked so full of life, and her 
interest in all things was so keen and eager that I never for a 
moment thought her old or linked to her lite the imagination of 
death. It is a sore loss to lose one so fresh, so alive, so ardent in 
all good and beautiful things, and it must leave you in a great lone- 
liness. . . . How well, how nobly she lived her life ! It shames us 
to think of all she did, and yet it kindles us so much that we lose 
our shame in its inspiration. 

'■ On October •^i, 1807. 



290 LADY JOHN RUSSELL [1898 

Mr. Frederic Harrison to Lady Agatha Russell 

February 16, 1898 
. . . The news of the great sorrow which has fallen on you 
came upon my wife and myself as a dreadful surprise. . . . Over 
and over again I tried to say to the world outside all that I felt of 
the noble nature and the grand life of your mother, but every time 
I tried my pen fell from my hand. I was too sad to think or 
write ; full only of the sense of the friend whom I had lost, and of 
the great example she has left to our generation. She has fulfilled 
her mission on earth, and all those who have known her — and they 
are very many — will all their lives be sustained by the memory of 
her courage, dignity, and truth. She had so much of the character 
of the Roman matron — a type we know so little nowadays — who, 
being perfect in all the beauty of domestic life, yet even more con- 
spicuously raised the public life of her time. I shall never, while 
I have life, forget the occasions this last summer and autumn when 
I had been able to see more of her than ever before, and especially 
that last hour I spent with her, when you were away at Weston, 
the memory of which now comes back to me like a death-bed 
parting. To have known her was to ride above the wretched 
party politics to which our age is condemned. I cannot bear to 
think of all that this bereavement means to you. It must be, and 
will remain, irreparable. 

Mr. James Bryce^ to Lady Agatha Russell 

March 10, 1898 
Your mother always seemed to me one of the most noble and 
beautiful characters I had ever known — there was in her so much 
gentleness, so much firmness, so much earnestness, so ardent a love 
for all high things and all the best causes. One always came away 
from seeing her struck afresh by these charms of nature, and feeling 
the better for having seen how old age had in no way lessened 
her interest in the progress of the world, her faith in the triumph 
of good. 

Mrs. Sinclair to Mr. Rollo Russell 

January, 1900 
I loved and honoured my dear lady more than any one I ever 
served. In my long life of service, where all had been good and 
kind to me, she was the dearest and best. 

The funeral service was held on the 21st of January in the 
village church at Chenies, where her husband had been buried 
• The Right Hon. James Bryce, British Ambassador at Washington. 



i9oo] POEM ON DEATH 291 

among his ancestors. The Burial Service of the Church of 
England, the solemnity and beauty of which she had always 
deeply felt, was read in the presence of many friends and 
relations assembled to pay their last tribute of respect to her 
memory. 

Not long before her death Lady Russell had written these 
lines : 

O shadowy form majestic, nearer gliding, 

And ever nearer ! Thou whose silent tread 

Not ocean, chasm, or mountain can delay, 

Not even hands in agony outstretched. 

Or bitterest tears of breaking hearts, that fain 

Would stay thy dread approach to those most dear. 

Vainly from thee we seek to hide ; thou wield'st 

A sceptred power that none below may challenge ; 

Yet no true monarch thou — but Messenger 

Of Him, Monarch supreme and Love eternal, 

Who holdeth of all mysteries the key ; — 

And in thy dark unfathomable eyes 

A star of promise lieth. 

Then O ! despite all failure, guilt and error, 

Crushing beneath their weight my faltering soul, 

When my hour striketh, when with Time I part, 

When face to face we stand, with naught between, 

Come as a friend, O Death ! 

Lay gently thy cold hand upon my brow, 

And still the fevered throb of this blind life. 

This fragment, mournful yet so fair — this dream, 

Aspiring, earth-bound, passionate — and waft me 

Where broken harmonies will blend once more. 

And severed hearts once more together beat ; 

Where, in our Father's fold, all, all shall be fulfilled. 



RECOLLECTIONS OF FRANCES, 
COUNTESS RUSSELL 




THE DOWAGER COUNTESS RUSSELL. 1884 



RECOLLECTIONS OF FRANCES, COUNTESS 
RUSSELL 

By Justin McCarthy 

SOME of the dearest and most treasured memories of my 
lifetime are those belonging to the years during which 
I had the honour of being received among her friends by the 
late Countess Russell. 

That friendship lasted more than twenty years, and its 
close on this earth was only brought about by Lady Russell's 
death. 

There hangs now in my study, seeming to look down upon 
me while I write, a photograph of Lady Russell with her name 
written on it in her own handwriting. That photograph I 
received but a short time before her death, and it is to be with 
me so long as I live and look upon this earth. 

I had some slight, very slight, acquaintance with the late 
Earl Russell, ever best known to fame as Lord John Russell, 
some years before I became one of his wife's friends. I met 
Lord John Russell for the first time in 1858, when he was 
attending a meeting of the Social Science Association, held 
in Liverpool, where I was then a young journalist, and I had 
the good fortune to be presented to him. After that, when I 
settled in London, I met him occasionally in the precincts of 
Westminster Palace, and I had some interesting conversations 
with him which I have mentioned in published recollections 
of mine. During all that time I had, however, but a merely 
slight and formal acquaintanceship with his gifted wife. 

When I came to know her more closely she had settled 

29s 



296 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

herself in her home at Pembroke Lodge in Richmond Park, 
and it is with that delightful home that my memories of 
her are mainly associated. She received her friends and 
acquaintances in general there on certain appointed days in 
each week. I need hardly say how gladly I availed myself of 
every opportunity for the enjoyment of such a visit, and 
especially for the enjoyment of Lady Russell's conversation 
and companionship. 

I have known many gifted women, among them many 
gifted authoresses, but I have not known any woman who 
could have surpassed Lady Russell in the varied charms of 
her conversation. Most of us, men and women, have 
usually the habit of carrying our occupations with us, meta- 
phorically at least, wherever we go, and therefore have some 
difficulty in entering with full appreciation into conversational 
fields in which we do not find ourselves quite at home. 

Lady Russell was not like most of us in that quality. Her 
chief natural interest, one might readily suppose, would have 
been centred in questions belonging to the domain of politics, 
national and international, she having been for so great a 
part of her life the wife and the close companion of one of 
England's leading statesmen. 

But Lady Russell was endowed with a peculiarly receptive 
mind, and she felt an interest quite natural and spontaneous in 
every subject which could interest educated and rational 
human beings — in art, literature, and science ; in the history 
and the growth of all countries ; in the condition of the poor 
and the struggling throughout the world ; in every effort made 
by knowledge, benevolence, and enlightened purpose for the 
benefit of humanity. She had evidently also a strong desire 
to add to her own large stock of information, and she appears 
to have felt that whenever she came into converse with any 
fellow-being she was in communication with one who could 
tell her something which she did not already know. 

In this characteristic she reminded me strongly of William 
Ewart Gladstone. 

There is, or there used to be, a common impression 
throughout many social circles in this country, that when 



RECOLLECTIONS 297 

Gladstone in private was the centre of any company, he 
generally contrived to keep most of the talk to himself. 
This always seemed to me an entire misconception, for I 
had many opportunities of observing that Gladstone in social 
companionship seemed much more anxious to get some new 
ideas from those around him than to pour out to them from 
his own treasures of information. 

Lady Russell loved to draw forth from the artist something 
about his art, from the scholar something about his books, to 
compare the ideas of the politician with her own, to lead the 
traveller into accounts of his travels, to get from the scientific 
student some of his experiences in this or that domain of 
science, and from those who visited the poor some suggestions 
which might serve her during her constant work in the same 
direction. 

Even on subjects concerning which the greatest and 
sharpest divisions of opinion might naturally arise — political 
questions, for instance — Lady Russell seemed as much 
interested in listening to the clear exposition and defence 
of a political opponent's views as she might have been in the 
cordial exchange of sympathetic and encouraging opinions. 
When I first began to make one of Lady Russell's frequent 
visitors, there was, of course, between us a natural sympathy 
of political opinion which was made all the stronger because 
of momentous events that had lately passed, or were then 
passing, in the world around. 

The great Civil War in the North American States 
had come to an end many years before I began to visit 
Lady Russell at her home, and I need hardly remind my 
readers that by far the larger proportion of what we call 
" society " in England had given its sympathies entirely to the 
cause of the South, and had firmly maintained, almost to the 
very end, that the South was destined to have a complete 
victory over its opponents. Lady Russell gave her sympathies 
to the side of the Northern States, as was but natural, seeing 
that the success of the North would mean the abolition of that 
system of slavery which was to her heart and to her conscience 
incapable of defence or of palliation. 



298 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

I had paid my first visit to the United States not many 
years after the end of the Civil War — a visit prolonged for 
nearly two years and extending from New York to San 
Francisco and from Maine to Louisiana. I had therefore a 
good deal to tell Lady Russell about the various experiences 
I had had during this my first visit to the now reunited States, 
and the lights which they threw for me on the origin and 
causes of the Civil War. 

I may say here that Lady Russell was always very anxious 
that the public should fully understand and appreciate the 
attitude taken by her late husband with regard to the Civil 
War. In a letter written to me on October 20, 1879, Lady 
Russell refers me to a speech made by her husband on 
March 23, 1863, and she goes on to say: 

It shows unanswerably how strong was his opinion against the 
recognition of the Southern States, even at a moment when the 
tide of battle was so much in their favour that he, in common, I 
think, with most others, looked upon separation as likely to be the 
final issue. As long as the abolition of slavery was not openly 
announced, as he thought it ought to have been, as one of the 
main objects of the war on the part of the Federals, he felt no 
warm sympathy with their cause. But after President Lincoln's 
proclamation it was quite different, and no man rejoiced with 
deeper thankfulness than he did at the final triumph of the 
Northern States, for no man held slavery in more utter abhor- 
rence. 

I have thought it well to introduce this quotation just here 
because it is associated at once with my earliest recollections 
of Lady Russell, and at the same time with a subject of con- 
troversy which may almost be said to have passed out of the 
realms of disputation since that day. 

The American States have now long been absolutely 
reunited ; there is no difference of opinion whatever in this 
country with regard to the question of slavery, and yet it is 
quite certain that during the American Civil War a large 
number of conscientious, humane, and educated Englishmen 
were firmly convinced that the American Republic was about 
to break in two, and that the sympathies of England ought to 



RECOLLECTIONS 299 

go with the rebelling Southern States. It is well, therefore, 
that we should all be reminded of Lord Russell's attitude 
on these subjects. 

I had much to tell Lady Russell of the various impressions 
made on me during my wanderings through the States, and by 
the distinguished American authors, statesmen, soldiers — 
Emerson, Longfellow, Bryant, Oliver Wendell Holmes, 
Charles Sumner, Wendell Phillips, General Grant, General 
Sherman. With the public career of each of these men Lady 
Russell was thoroughly acquainted, but she was much inter- 
ested in hearing all that I could tell her about their ways 
of life and their personal habits and characteristics. 

Then there were, of course, political questions at home con- 
cerning which there was deep sympathy between Lady Russell 
and me, and on which we had many long conversations. 
She had the most intense and enlightened sympathy with the 
great movements going on in these countries for the spread 
of political equality and of popular education. 

Every statesman who sincerely and actively supported the 
principles and measures tending towards these ends was 
regarded as a friend by this noble-hearted woman. 

I had been for many years a leader-writer and more 
recently editor of the Morning Star, the London daily news- 
paper which advocated the views of Cobden and Bright, and 
I had more recently still been elected to the House of 
Commons as a member of the Irish Nationalist Party, and 
thus again I found myself in thorough sympathy with the 
opinions and the feelings of my hostess. 

Lady Russell had long been an advocate of that truly 
Liberal policy towards Ireland which is now accepted as the 
only principle by all really enlightened Liberal English men and 
women ; and she thoroughly understood the condition, the 
grievances, the needs, and the aspirations of Ireland. The 
readers of this volume will see in some passages extracted from 
Lady Russell's diaries and letters how deep and strong were 
her feelings on the subject. She followed with the most 
intense interest and with the most penetrating observation 
the whole movement of Ireland's national struggle down to 



300 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

the very close of her life. Her letters on this question 
alone — letters addressed to me — would in themselves serve to 
illumine even now the minds of many English readers on this 
whole subject. Lady Russell was in no sense a partisan on 
any political question — I mean she never gave her approval to 
everything said or done by the leaders of any political party 
merely because the one main object of that party had her full 
sympathy and approval. Reading over many of her letters to 
me on various passages of the Home Rule agitation inside and 
outside Parliament, I have been once again filled with admira- 
tion and with wonder at the keen sagacity, the prophetic 
instinct, which she displayed with regard to this or that 
political movement or political man. 

All through these letters it becomes more and more 
manifest that Lady Russell's devotedness was in every 
instance to principle rather than to party, to measures 
rather than to men. By these words I do not mean to 
convey the idea that her nature led her habitually into any 
cold and over-calculating criticism of political leaders whom 
she admired, and in whom she had been led to feel 
confidence. 

Her generous nature was enthusiastic in its admiration of 
the men whose leadership in some great political movement 
had won her sympathy from the first ; but even with these 
her admiration was overruled and kept in order by her 
devotion to the principles which they were undertaking to 
carry into effect, and by the fidelity with which they adhered 
to these principles. Even among intelligent and enlightened 
men and women we often find in our observation of public 
affairs that there are instances in which the followers of a 
trusted leader are carried away by their personal devotion 
into the championship of absolute errors which the leader 
is committing — errors that might prove perilous or even, for 
the time, fatal to the cause of which he is the recognised 
advocate. 

Lady Russell always set the cause above the man, regarding 
him mainly as the instrument of the cause ; and if the alter- 
native were pressed upon her, would have withdrawn from 



RECOLLECTIONS 301 

his leadership rather than tacitly allow the cause to be 
misled. This, however, would have been done only as a 
last resort and after the most full, patient, and generous con- 
sideration of the personal as well as the public question. 

We men do not expect to find in an enthusiastic, tender, 
and what may be called exquisitely feminine woman the 
quality of clear and guiding discrimination between the policy 
of the leader and the principles of the cause which he under- 
takes to lead. We are inclined to assume that the woman in 
such a case, if she has already made a hero of the man, will be 
apt to think that everything he proposes to do must be the 
right thing to do, and that any question raised as to the 
wisdom and justice of any course adopted by him is a treason 
against his leadership. 

Lady Russell never seemed to me to yield for a moment to 
any such sentiment of mere hero-worship. She set, as I have 
said, the cause above the man, and she measured the man 
according to her interpretation of his policy towards the 
cause. 

But at the same time she was never one of those who 
cannot be convinced that some particular course is not the 
wisest and most just to adopt without at once rushing to the 
conclusion that the leader who makes any mistakes must be 
in the wrong because of wilfulness or mere incapacity, and is 
therefore not worthy any longer of admiration and trust. 

I have many letters from her, written at the time of some 
serious crisis in the fortunes of the Irish National movement, 
which show the keenest and the earliest intelligence of some 
mistake in the policy of the party on this or that immediate 
question without showing the slightest inclination to diminish 
her confidence in the sincerity and the purposes of its leaders, 
any more than in the justice of the cause. I can well recollect 
that in many instances she proved to be absolutely in the right 
when she thus gave me her opinion, and that events after- 
wards fully maintained the wisdom and the justice of her 
criticism. The reason why so many of Lady Russell's 
opinions were conveyed to me by letter was that I had to 
be, like all my companions of the Irish Parliamentary Party, 



302 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

a constant attendant at the debates in the House of Com- 
mons, and that many days often passed without my having an 
opportunity to visit Lady Russell and converse with her on 
the subjects which had so deep an interest for her as well as for 
me. I therefore was in the habit of writing often to her from 
the House of Commons in order to give her my own ideas 
as to the significance and importance of this or that debate, of 
this or that speech and its probable effect on the House and 
on the outer public. Lady Russell never failed to favour 
me with her own views on such subjects, and the views were 
always her own, and were never a mere good-natured and 
friendly adoption of the opinions thus offered to her. 

Then, when I had the opportunity of visiting her at 
Pembroke Lodge, we were sure to compare and discuss our 
views in the conversations which she made so delightful and 
so inspiring. 

One of her marvellous qualities was that her interest and her 
intellect were never wholly absorbed in the passing political 
questions, but that she could still keep her mind open to other 
and entirely different subjects. The chamber of her mind 
seemed to me to be like one of those mysterious apartments 
about which we read in fairy stories, which were endowed 
with a magical capacity of expansion and reception. 

I have come to her home at a time when, for those whose 
lives were mainly passed in political work, there was some 
subject then engaging the attention of all politicians in these 
countries — some subject in which I well knew that Lady 
Russell was deeply and thoroughly interested. 

But it sometimes happened that there were friends 
just then with her who did not profess any interest in 
politics, and who were mainly concerned about some new 
topic in letters or art or science, and I often observed with 
admiration the manner in which Lady Russell could give 
herself up for the time to the question in which those visitors 
were chiefly interested, and could show her sympathy and 
knowledge as if she had not lately been thinking of anything 
else. About this there was evidently no mere desire to please 
her latest visitors, no sense of obligation to submit herself for 



RECOLLECTIONS 303 

the time to their especial subject, but a genuine sympathy with 
every effort of human intellect, and a sincere desire to gather 
all that could be gathered from every garden of human 
culture. 

Many of Lady Russell's letters to me on the events and the 
fortunes, the hopes and the disasters of our Irish National 
movement have in them an actual historical interest, such as 
the one dated November 27, 1890, which is quoted in this 
volume. It was written during the crisis which came upon 
our Irish National party at the time when the hopes of Mr. 
Parnell's most devoted friends in England as well as in 
Ireland were that after the result of a recent divorce suit 
Parnell would resign, for a time at least, the leadership of 
the party and only seek to return to it when he should have 
made what reparation was in his power to his own honour and 
to pubhc feeling. In a letter of December 26, 1891, Lady 
Russell says : " Your poor country has risen victorious from 
many a worse fall, and will not be disheartened now, nor bate 
a jot of heart or hope." 

Lady Russell's letters not merely illustrate her deep and 
noble sympathy with the cause and the hopes of Ireland, but 
also they are evidence of the clear judgment and foresight 
which were qualities at once of her intellect and of her feeling. 
Scattered throughout her letters to me are many other evi- 
dences of the same kind with regard to other great political 
and social questions then coming up at home or abroad. 
I wish to say, however, that her letters do not by any means 
occupy themselves only with political questions, with Parlia- 
mentary debates, and with legislative measures. To para- 
phrase the words of the great Latin poet, whatever men and 
women were doing in arts and letters, in social progress, and 
in all that concerns humanity, supplied congenial subjects for 
the letters written by this most gifted, most observant, most 
intellectual woman to her friends. 

One certainly has not lived in vain who has had the 
honour of being admitted to that friendship for some twenty 
years. 

I have no words, literally none, in which to express 



304 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

adequately the admiration and the affection and the de- 
votion which I felt for Lady Russell. No higher type of 
womanhood has yet been born into our modern world. 

Lady Agatha Russell is rendering a most valuable service 
to humanity in preparing and giving to the world the records 
of her mother's life which appear in this volume, A monu- 
ment more appropriate and more noble could not be raised 
over any grave than that which the daughter is thus raising to 
the memory of her mother. 



APPENDIX 

MEMORIAL ADDRESS 
By Frederic Harrison 

AFTER Lady Russell's death a few friends decided — 
unknown to her family, who were touched by this mark 
of respect — to put up a tablet to her memory and hold a 
Memorial Service in the Free Church at Richmond, Surrey. 
The tablet, which is of beaten copper, beautifully worked, 
bears the following inscription : — 

In memory of Frances Anna Maria, daughter of Gilbert, 
second Earl of Minto, and widow of Lord John Russell, who 
was born November 15, 1815, and died January 17, 1898. In 
gratitude to God for her noble life this tablet is placed by her 
fellow- worshippers. 

The Memorial Service was held on July 14, 1900, when 
the tablet was unveiled and the following address was 
delivered by Mr. Frederic Harrison. 

Now that our gathering of to-day has given full scope to the 
loving sorrow and filial piety of the children, descendants, and 
family of her whom we meet to commemorate and honour — now 
that the minister, whom she was accustomed to hear, and the 
worshippers, with whom she was wont to join in praise and 
prayer, have recorded their solemn union in the same sacred 
memory, I crave leave to offer my humble tribute of devotion as 
representing the general circle of her friends, and the far wider 
circle of the public to whom she was known only by her life, her 
character, her nobility of soul, and her benefactions. 

I do not presume to speak of that beauty of nature which 
Frances Countess Russell showed in the sanctity of the family, in 

X 30s 



3o6 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

the close intimacy of her private friends. Others have done this 
far more truly, and w^ill continue to bear viritness to her life whilst 
this generation and the next shall survive. My only title to join 
my voice to-day with that of her children and of this congregation 
resides in the fact that my memory of her goes back over so long 
a period ; that I have known her under circumstances, first, of the 
highest public activity, and then again, in a time of severe retire- 
ment and private simplicity ; that I have seen her in days of 
happiness and in days of mourning ; at the height of her influence 
and dignity in the eyes of our nation and of the nations about us, 
as well as in her days of grief and disappointment at the failure of 
her hopes, and the break up of the causes she had at heart. And 
I have known her always, in light or in gloom, in joy or in misery, 
the same brave, fearless, natural, and true heart— come fair or 
foul, come triumph or defeat. 

Yes ! it was my privilege to have known Lady Russell in the 
lifetime of the eminent statesman whose name she bore, and 
whose life of toil in the public service she inspired ; I knew them 
five-and-thirty years ago, when he was at the head of the State 
Government and immersed in public cares. And I am one of 
those who can bear witness to the simple dignity with which she 
adorned that high station and office, and the beautiful affection 
and quiet peace of the home-life she maintained, like a Roman 
matron, when her husband was called to serve the State. And it 
so happened that I passed part of the last summer that she lived 
to see, here in Richmond, within a short walk of her house. 
There I saw her constantly and held many conversations with her 
upon public affairs ; and perhaps those were amongst the last 
occasions on which her powerful sense and heroic spirit had full 
play before the fatal illness which supervened in that very autumn. 

I do not hesitate to speak of her powerful sense and her heroic 
spirit, for she united the statesman- like insight into political 
problems with the unflinching courage to stand by the cause of 
truth, humanity, and justice. She was not impulsive at all, not 
hasty in forming her decisions, still less did she seek publicity 
or take pleasure in heading a movement. But, with the great 
experience of politicians and of political things which in her long 
life and her rare opportunities she had acquired, she saw straight 
to the heart of so many vexed problems of our day ; and when 
once convinced of the truth, she held fast to it with a noble 
intrepidity of soul. In a life more or less conversant with public 
men now for forty years past, I have rarely known either man or 
woman who had a more sound judgment in great public questions. 
And I have known none who surpassed her in courage, in direct- 
ness, and in fixity of purpose. No sense that she and her friends 
had to meet overwhelming odds would ever make her faint-hearted. 
No desertion by friends and old comrades ever caused her to 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS 307 

waver. No despair ever touched that stalwart soul, however dark 
the outlook might appear ; for it was her faith that no right or 
just cause was ever really lost, however for the time it were 
defeated and contemned. 

Lady Frances Elliot, as she was before marriage, came of a 
race of soldiers, governors, and tried servants of the State, and she 
married into a race which has long stood in the front rank of the 
historic servants of the Crown and of the people. But neither the 
house of Elliot nor that of Russell in so many generations ever 
bred man or woman with a keener sense of public duty, a more 
generous nature, and a more magnanimous soul. In the annals of 
that famous house, whose traditions are part of the history of 
England, there has been no finer example of the old motto, 
noblesse oblige, if we understand it to mean — those who have high 
place inherit with it heavy responsibilities. That idea was the 
breath of her life to Countess Russell, as assuredly it was also to 
her husband, and she whose memory we keep sacred to-day is 
worthy to take her place beside that Rachel Lady Russell of old, 
who, more than two centuries ago, suffered so deeply in the cause 
of freedom and of conscience ; she whose blood runs in the veins 
of the children who to-day revere the memory of their mother. 

The Italians call a man of heroic nature — a Garibaldi or a 
Manin— -Mo;«o antico — " one of the ancient type " — one whom we 
rarely see in our modern days of getting on in the world and 
following the popular cry. I have never heard the phrase applied 
to a lady, and, perhaps, donna antica might be held to bear a 
double sense. But we need some such phrase to describe the 
line quality of the spirit which lit up the whole nature of Frances 
Countess Russell. She had within her that rare flame which we 
attribute to the martyrs of our sacred and secular histories — that 
power of inspiring those whom she impressed with the resolve to 
do the right, to seek the truth, to defend the oppressed, at all cost, 
and against all odds. 

It has been my privilege to have listened to many men and to 
some women who in various countries and in different causes have 
been held to have exerted great influence, and to have forced ideas, 
principles, and reforms on the men of their time. But I have listened 
to none in our country or abroad who seemed to me to inspire the 
spirit more purely with the desire to hold fast by the right, to thrust 
aside the wrong, to be just, faithful, considerate, and honourable, 
to feel for the fatherless and the poor, and not to despise the 
humble and the meek. I know that all my remaining term of life 
there will remain deeply engraven on my memory all that she 
said, all that she felt, in the last conversation I ever held with her 
at the very commencement of her last fatal illness. Weak and 
suffering as she was, unable to rise from her invalid chair, she 
asked me to come and tell her what I knew, and to hear what she 



3o8 LADY JOHN RUSSELL 

felt about the public crisis of that time (I speak of the end of 1897). 
The storm of South Africa was even then rising like a cloud no 
bigger than a man's hand out of the southern seas. I listened to 
her : and her deep and thrilling words of indignation, shame, pity, 
and honour sank into my mind, as if they had been the last words 
of some pure and higher spirit that was about to leave us, but would 
not leave us without words of warning and exhortation to follow 
honour, to serve truth, to eschew evil and to do good, to seek 
peace and ensue it. I knew well that I was listening to her for 
the last time ; for her life was visibly ebbing away. But I listened 
to her as to one who was passing into a world of greater per- 
manence and of more spiritual meaning than our fleeting and 
too material world of sense and sight. And for the rest of my life 
I shall continue to bear in my heart this message as it seemed to 
me of a nobler world and of a higher truth. 

Yes ! she has passed into a nobler world and to a higher truth 
— the world of the good and just men and women whose memory 
survives their mortal career, and whose inspiring influence works 
for good ever in generations to come. In this Free Church I can 
speak freely, for I too profoundly believe in a future life of every 
good and pure soul beyond the grave, in the perpetuity of every 
just and noble life in the sum of human progress and enlightenment. 
And in a sense that is quite as real as yours, even if it differ from 
your sense in form, I also make bold to say, this corruptible must 
put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality — 
Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting ? 
O grave, where is thy victory ? Therefore, my beloved brethren, 
be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of 
Humanity, for as much as ye know that your labour is not in vain 
in Humanity. 

Surely we have before us a high example of what it is to be 
steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in good work, in the 
memory of Frances Elliot Countess Russell, who united in herself 
principles typified in the historic mottoes of her own house and 
that of her husband's — who kept her high courage under all 
adversities and opposition, in the spirit of che sara sara, " stand 
fast come what may" — in the spirit of that other motto of the 
Elliots, suaviter et fortiter, " with all the gentleness of a woman 
and all the fortitude of a man." 



INDEX 



INDEX 



Abbotsford, 35 

Abercromby, Lady Mary (see also Dun- 
fermline, Lady) — 
Marriage, 29 ; letters from Lady John 
Russell, 36, 38-40, 46-7, 59, 66-7, 
70-3= 76-7, 80, 84, 89, 93, 95-8, 
100-3, 106-7, I 10-13, 115-16, 124, 
134, 166-7, 173 ; letters from Lady 
Minto, 37-8, 40-1, 43 ; correspon- 
dence with Lord John Russell, 
43-4, 45 ; letter from Lord Minto, 
64 ; visit of Lady John Russell, 165 ; 
mentioned in the letters, 12, 17, 19, 

83 

Abercomby, Mr. Ralph, afterwards Lord 
Dunfermline, 29, 43, 70, 107, no, 115, 
196 ; Minister at the Hague, 165 

Aberdeen, Lord — 
The Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, 109-10 ; 
consents to form a Ministry, 123-4 ; 
and Lord John Russell, 124-5, 139, 
149 ; and the Eastern Question, 
132 ; and Reform, 135 ; Lord John's 
resignation, 141, 143, 160 ; Lord 
John's appreciation of, 144; resigna- 
tion, 145 

Abergeldie Castle, 193 

Acton, Lord, "Historical Essays and 
Studies," 229 

Adams, Mr., 194 

Adelaide, queen of William IV, 21, 22 

Admiralty, the, Lord Minto at, 24, 28-9, 
38-44 ; Mrs. Drummond's descrip- 
tion, 31-4 

" AduUamites," the, 204 

Affirmation Bill, Gladstone's, 264, note = 

Alabama, case of the, 196-7, 236 

Albert Hall, foundation stone laid, 214 



Albert, Prince Consort — 
and Lord John, 96, 104 ; Prussian 
sympathies, 1 14-15 ; visit to Pem- 
broke Lodge, 121 ; and Italy, 178 ; 
at Coburg, 191 ; death, 195 ; "Trent " 
affair, 200 ; " Life of Prince Albert," 
244-5, 252 ; otheiivise mentioned, 76, 

95 

Aldworth, 244, 281 

Allen, Grant, " Science in Arcady," 

283 
Althorp, Lord, 6 ; and the Irish Coercion 

Bill, 19 
Amberley, Lady, 199, 222, 223, 240, 248 ; 

death of, 242, 243, 244 
Amberley, Lord, see also Russell, John — 
Engagement, 199 ; defeated at Leeds, 

199 ; returned for Nottingham, 212 ; 

maiden speech, 213 ; defeat in 1868 

...218 ; letters from Lady Russell, 

240, 241, 245-6 ; death of, 247-8 ; 

otherwise mentioned, 164, 198, 202, 

222 
American Civil War, the — 
England's position, 193-4 ; seizure of 

the Southern Commissioners, 194-5 ; 

Lord Russell's speech on, 197 ; 

feeling in England, 297-8 
Anderson, Dr., of Richmond, 286, note °, 

288 and note ' 
Anti-Corn Law League bazaar at Man- 
chester, 63 
Armenian refugees at Pembroke Lodge, 

285 
Arrow, the, coasting vessel, 167 
Athanasian Creed, the, 235 
Aumale, Due d', 103, note ' 
Austen, Jane, 258 ; " Emma," 286 



3" 



312 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



Austria — 

Influence in Germany, i6 ; unpopu- 
larity of the Government, 54, 55 ; and 
Denmark, 114; Palmerston's policy 
towards, 1 16 ; Conference of Vienna, 
149, 152-3 ; proposals of, and 
resignation of Lord John Russell, 
158-62 ; and Italy, 175 ; after 
Solferino, 178-9 ; Peace of Villa- 
franca, 179-81 ; and the proposed 
Congress at Zurich, 181 ; Prussian 
war on, 207 ; cession of Venetia, 
209 ; cause of the Franco-German 
War, 228-9 

Azeglio,Marquisd',Piedmontese Minister, 
174, 176 



Balmoral, 200, 206 ; Lord John Russell 
at, 103-4 

Baring, Mr.,Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
tariff proposals, 41-2 

Beaumont, Lord, in 

Bedford, (6th) Duke of, 48-9, 51 

Bedford, (7th) Duke of, letters from 
Lord Russell, 58, 144 ; visit of Lord 
and Lady John Russell, 61 ; on the 
attacks on Lord John, 145-6 ; letter 
from Lady John, 160-1 ; death, 192 

Bedford, (9th) Duke of, 213 

Bennett, Rev. W. J. E., of St. Paul's, 83 

Berlin, Lord Minto appointed Minister, 

15-19 
Bernard, Dr., acquitted, 174 
Bernstorfif, Count, 233 
Berrys, the Miss, 23, 83 
Bessborough, Lord, Irish opinions, 81, 

86 ; on the Coercion Bill, 88 
Birmingham, enfranchisement, 10 ; 

bombs manufactured in, 173 
Bismarck, Count — 
In Berlin, 19 ; and Palmerston, 200 ; 

declares war on Austria, 206 ; the 

Franco-German War, 228-9 
Blyth, Miss Lilian [Mrs. Wilfred Praeger], 

letter from Lady Russell, 265 
Blyth, Rev. F. C, 265, note" 
Bognor, news of Reform at, 14 
Boileau, Mr., letters to Lady Melgund, 

132, 137-8 
Bonaparte, Louis, 102 



Bourbons, the, 11 ; Napoleon's questions 

concerning, 53-4 
Bowhill, 46, 47, 59 

Bowood, Lady John Russell at, 23-4, 27 
Bowring, Sir John, cause of the war with 

China, 168 
Bradlaugh, 264, note ' 
Braico, Dr. Cesare, 177, 185 
Brazil, Emperor of, at Pembroke Lodge, 

233 
Bright, John — 
Defeat of, 169 ; at Chesham Place, 

202-3 ; speeches, 204 ; and Reform, 

212, 214 ; letter to Lady Russell, 253 ; 

otherwise mentionedf6S,7i,yy,l2^,2gg 
Bright, J. F., 148 

British and Foreign School Society, 257 
Broadstairs, visit of the Russells. 250 
Brooke, Rev. A. Stopford, letter to Lady 

Agatha Russell, 289 
Brooks's, news of Lord John's acceptance 

of the Colonial Seals, 150, 151 
Brougham, Lord — 
and Lord Melbourne's dismissal, 

21 ; and the Corn Law, 63 ; and 

William IV, 221 
Browning, Robert, 258, 260 
Brunow, Baron, Russian ambassador, 113 
Bryant, W. C, 299 
Bryce, Mr. James, letter to Lady Agatha 

Russell, 290 and note ' 
Brydone, Mrs., death, 27, 240 
Buccleuch, Duke of, 68 ; lends Bowhill 

to Lord John, 47 ; on Disraeli, 214 
Buhler, Miss, 266, note ' ; letters from 

Lady Russell, 266, 267-8 
Buller, Charles, 65 
Buol, Count, Austrian Minister, 153 
Burdett, Sir Francis, and Lord John 

Russell, 50 
Burnet, Bishop, 27 
Burns, Robert, 27, 258 
Byron, Lady, 221 and note^ 
Byron, Lord,22i and note ', 258 ; " Giaour," 

86 ; " Childe Harold," quoted, 224 

Cairns, Lord, mentioned, 213 

Campbell, Lord, " Lives," 82 

Canada, Governorship offered to Lord 

Minto, 19 ; Lady Fanny and the 

Patriots, 28 



INDEX 



313 



Cannes, Lord and Lady Russell at, 234-6 

Canning, Lord Granville's correspon- 
dence with, 175 

Canning, Sir Stratford, British Ambas- 
sador at Constantinople, 132 

Carnarvon, Lord, resignation, 211 

Castlereagh, Lord, 223 

Catholic Emancipation Bill, 7, 28, 58 

Cavour — 
and Napoleon III, 179, 183 ; resigna- 
tion, 180 ; the terms of unity, 182 ; 
and Garibaldi, 184-7 ! otherwise 
mentioned, 165, 176, 185, 189, 221 

Ceremonies, religious. Lady John Rus- 
sell's opinion concerning, 1 10-13 

Channing's, Dr., writings, 258 

Charles X, 10-13 

Chartist movement, 90, 94, 95, 97, 98 

Chartres, Due de, 103, note 

Chelmsford, Lord, saying of, 196 

Chenies, Lady Russell's funeral at, 290-1 

Chester, Fenian attempt on the arsenal, 
216 

Chesterfield, Lord, " Letters," 269-70 

Chillon, 233-4 

Chinese War, the, 1857. ..167-9 ; Lord 
John Russell's speech, 193 ; Palmer- 
ston's policy, 200 

Chorley Wood, Rickmansworth, 89, 90 

Christian, Princess, at Cannes, 235 

Chronicle, the, and the Eastern Ques- 
tion, 133 

Church of England, 9, 83 ; the Gorham 
case, 109 

Clarendon, Lady, 243 

Clarendon, Lord — 
Viceroy of Ireland, 65, 99, 100, 274 ; 
at the Foreign Office, 153, 154-6, 
201 ; letter to Lord Russell, 155-6 ; 
letter from Lord Russell, 155 ; 
despatch to Naples, 178 ; letter to 
Lord "Granville, 201 

Coalition Ministry, the, 123 ; results, 196 

Cobden, Richard — 
Oratory, 50 ; Lord William Russell 
on, 83 ; comments on Lord John, 
158 ; motion regarding the China 
measures, 167-8 ; defeat in 1857... 
169 ; Free Trade Treaty with France, 
190 ; otherwise mentioned, 68, 77, 
124, 299 



Cockburn, Lord Chief Justice, speech, 107 
Coercion (Ireland) Bill, 19, 86, 88, 94 
Coombe Wood, Richmond, 122 
Conservative Party, the — 
" Moderate Reform," 22 ; split on 

Catholic Emancipation, 28 ; position 

in 1852. ..123 
Conspiracy to Murder Bill, 173 
Corn Laws, the — 
Lord John Russell's proposal, 42 ; 

repeal of, 70-7 ; Macaulay on, 73-4 ; 

Peel's measure, 78-85 ; repealpassed, 

88 
Cowley, Lord, 154-5 
Cowper, William, 258 
Cranborne, Lord, resignation of, 2ii 

(see also Salisbury, (3rd) Marquis) 
Crimean War — 
Events leading to, 13 1-2 ; victories, 

140 ; Lord Malmesbury's report, 

145 ; Bright's History cited, 148 ; 

French alliance, 157 
Currie, Mr. Raikes, 169, 171 

Daily News, the — 
and the Eastern Question, 133 ; attack 
on Lord John, 159 ; Lord Russell's 
letters, 225-6 ; on Baron Stockmar, 
article quoted, 245, note ' 

Dante, 258 

Davitt, Michael, " Leaves from a Prison 
Diary," 277 

Denmark, war with Schleswig-Holstein, 
114 

Derby, (14th) Earl of— 
Ministry, 1851...117; fails to form a 
Government, 1855. ..148-9 ; cabinet, 
1858... 174 ; resignation in June, 176 ; 
denounces the Government's policy, 
199 ; and the franchise, 2io-ii ; 
resignation, 1868. ..215 ; illness, 215 ; 
otherwise mentioned, 213 

Derby, (15th) Earl of (see Stanley, Lord) 

Dickens, Charles — 
On the ragged schools, 85 ; " David 
Copperfield," 108 ; at Pembroke 
Lodge, 119, 213 ; congratulates 
Lord John Russell, 170 ; letters to 
Lady John Russell, 171, 205-6, 218 ; 
Lady Russell's preference for, 258 ; 
on Lord John Russell, quoted, 260 



3H 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



Dieppe, the Russells at, 238 

Dillon, John, on Lord John's resignation, 
146 

Dillon, John, and Parnell, 279 

Disraeli, Benjamin (Ear of Beacons- 
field)— 
114 ; personality, 174 ; Budget, 1852... 
123 ; and Free Trade, 123 ; Lady 
John Russell, on, 174 ; on Lord John 
Russell's motion, 108 ; his Franchise 
Bill, 175, 210-12 ; the Duke of Buc- 
cleuch on, 214 ; succeeds Lord Derby, 
215 ; resignation, 1868. ..216-18 ; 
letter to Lord Russell, 238-9 ; Par- 
liamentary courage, 250 ; otherwise 
mentioned^ 127, 223, 241 

Drewitt, Dr. F. D., 272 

Drouyn, M. de L'Huys, resignation of, 
153-4, 155, 156 

Drummond, Mrs. {see also Lister, Ade- 
laide), 34, 86, 119 ; on the Minto 
family, quoted, 31-3 ; letter from 
Lady Russell, 284 

Duff, Sir Mount Stuart Grant, letter to 
Lady Russell, 264-5 

Dufferin, Lord, letter to Lady John 
Russell, 104-S ; letter from Lady 
John Russell, 165 

Dunfermline, Lady {see also Aber- 
cromby, Lady Mary), letters from 
Lady Russell, 194, 195, 196, 207, 
209-10, 217-18, 222, 224-6, 229-33, 
23S> 237-41 ; death in Rome, 242 

Dunrozel, Haslemere, 144, 255 and note *, 
265 

Durham, Bishop of, letter from Lord 
John Russell, 109-11 

Durham, Lord, in Canada, 28 

Eastbourne, 28 

Eastern Question, the, events leading to 
the Crimean War, 131-2 ; Lord 
Palmerston's policy, 132-3 ; Glad- 
stone on, 250, 252 

Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, the, 109-10, 
123 

Edinburgh, 70, 78, 86, 266 

Edinburgh University, 51 

Education, Lord Russell and, 234-5 

Education Bill, 1839,.. 30 \ Mr. Forster's 
Act, 225, note ' 



Elba, Napoleon in, Lord John Russell's 

account, 51-6 
EUot, George, 251 ; «' Adam Bede," 

271 ; Lady Russell on, 286 
Elliot, Charles [Lady Russell's brother], 

12 
Elliot, George [Lady Russell's brother], 

12, 161 
Elliot, George [uncle of Lady Russell], 

22 
Elliot, Gilbert [brother of Lady Russell], 

4,46 
Elliot, Gilbert, afterwards Dean of 

Bristol, 26 
Elliot, Henry [brother of Lady Russell], 
mentioned m the letters, 17, 167 ; goes 
to Australia, 26 ; visit of, 60 
Elliot, John [uncle of Lady Russell], 
member of Parliament for Hawick, 
27,38 
Elliot, Lady Fanny, quotation from 
" Reminiscences of an Idler,'' 26 ; 
description of, 33 [see Russell, Lady 
John) 
Elliot, Lady Charlotte {see also Portal), 
mentioned in the letters, 5, 17, l8, 
29, 32, 109, 166, 214; Sir Henry 
Taylor and, 261 
Elliot, Lady Harriet, 32, 109 
Elliot, Miss, daughter of the Dean of 
Bristol, a reference to Lord Russell, 
242 
Emerson, R. W., 299 
Endsleigh, 61, 208 

English society, Lady Russell on, 227 
Etchegoyen, Comte d', 245 and note ^ 
Eugenie, Empress, and the Russells, 226 ; 

at Chislehurst, 233 and note ^ 
Eversley, Lord, 204 
Examiner, the, on Lord John Russell's 

resignation, 146 
Exeter Hall, lecture by Lord John at 
164, 165 ; meetings, 247 

Factory children, education of, Bill for, 

68 
Farrington, Rev. Silas, letter to Lady 

Agatha Russell, 289 
Fawcett, Professor, speech, 247 
Fazakerlie, Miss, 27 
Fenians, movement^of 1867. ..216 



INDEX 



315 



Fitzmaurice, Lord, 252 ; " Life of Lord 

Granville," quoted, 201 
Florence, robbers of, 54 ; the Russells 

in, 166-7 
Foreign Exchanges, Mr. Goschen's book 

on, 202 
Forster, W. E., 225-6 ; the Elementary 

Education Act, 225, note ' 
Fortescue, Chichester, Chief Secretary 

for Ireland, 109, 216 ; Lord Russell's 

three pamphlets, 215, 217, 219 
Fox, Charles James — 
and Lord John Russell, 49-50 ; 

Napoleon on, 56 ; foreign policy, 

186 ; otherwise mentioned, 267 
Fox Club, the, 78 
France — 
The July revolution, 16 ; deposition of 

Louis Philippe, 94-5 ; and the Greek 

crisis, 107 ; and Denmark, 114; the 

coup d'etat of December, 1851... 

117, 118 ; events leading to the 

Crimean War, 131-2 ; Cobden's 
~ Free Trade Treaty, 190 
Franchise, Mr. Locke King's motion, 

109, 115 and note ' 
Franco- German War, outbreak, 228-9 
Franklin, Sir John, 26 
'' Free Church," the, 9 
Free Church of Scotland, establishment, 

66 
Free Church, Richmond, the memorial 

tablet, 305 
Free Trade, the new principle, 41 ; Lady 

John and, 80 ; number of Free 

Traders in 1846.. .90 
Froude, J. A., at Chesham Place, 202 ; on 

removal of Irish grievances, 217 ; 

" Life of Lord Beaconsfield," passage 

quoted, 247 

Garbarino, Villa, 221 

Gardiner, Dr., 286 and note ' 

Garibaldi — 
Cavour and, 184 ; and the Sicilian 
rebels, 185 ; attack on Naples, 186-8 ; 
at Pembroke Lodge, 189; letter to 
Lord John, 246-7, 247, note ' ; other- 
wise mentioned, 221 

George III, 245, note ' ;" Napoleon on, 
54 



George IV, death, 10 ; Napoleon on, 54 ; 
story of, 221 

Germany — 
The Zollvcrein, 16, 114 ; influence of 
French affairs on, 16 ; the Crown 
Princess, 222 ; the Franco-German 
War, 228 ; the Crown Prince and 
the war, 232, 233 

Gibbon, historian, appearance, 52 

Gladstone, Right Hon. W. E.— 
and Lord John Russell, 50, 146 ; and 
the Corn Laws, 63 ; at the War and 
Colonial Office, 78 ; his first great 
speech, 107 ; his first Budget, 127, 
128 ; resignation, 149 ; Italian sym- 
pathies, 176, 178, 189 ; letters re- 
garding the Neapolitan prisoners, 
187 ; Budgets, 190 ; defeated at 
Oxford, 199; and the Franchise, 
201 ; introduces the Reform Bill, 
March, 1866... 203-5, 205, note^; 
reports Government defeat to Lord 
John, 206; and Disraeli's Fran- 
chise Bill, 211-12 ; letter to Dr. 
Pusey quoted, 212 ; the Irish Church 
question, 1868. ..216-17 ; visits to 
Pembroke Lodge, 219, 252 ; speech 
on Irish Church disestabHshment, 
219 ; conversation on Parliamentary 
courage, 250 ; the Affirmation Bill, 
264, note^ ; letters to Lady Russell, 
266-7, 273-4 ; his article on the 
Melbourne Ministry, 274 ; and 
Parnell, 276-9 ; Lady Russell on, 
282 ; " Gladstonian," the term, 282 ; 
his last Cabinet, 285 ; mentioned in 
the letters, 213, 241 ; Justin 
McCarthy on, 296 

Gladstone, Mrs., 63 ; letter to Lady John 
Russell, 128, 264 ; at Pembroke 
Lodge, 219, 252 

Glenelg, Lord, 24 

Godf rey,Miss Alice (see RusselI,Mrs.Rollo) 

Gortschakoff, Prince, Russian emissary, 

153 
Goschen, Mr., appointment, 202 
Graham, Sir James, 74, 146 ; resignation 

149 
Grant, General, 299 
Granville, Lord — 
Letter to Lady John, 136 ; correspon. 



3i6 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



dence with Canning, 175 ; sent for 
by the Queen, 176 ; and Italy, 178 ; 
correspondence with Lord Claren- 
don, 201 

Gray, Maxwell, "The Silence of Dean 
Maitland," 270 

Greece, the crisis of 1850... 106-7 ; 
Russian policy, 131 

Greville, Charles — 
Cited on Lord John Russell, 41, 65 ; on 
the Greek crisis, 106 

Grey, Lady, 98, 284-5 

Grey, (2nd) Earl — 
Prime Minister, 6, 10, 58, 61 ; resigna- 
tion, May, 1834.. .19 

Grey, (3rd) Earl, 75 and note \ 76, 78 ; 
death, 284-5 

Grey, Sir George, " Security of the 
Crown " Bill, 97 ; and Fergus 
O'Connor, 98 ; rumoured Irish 
rebellion, loi ; and the Conspiracy 
laws, 173-4 

Guizot, and Louis Philippe, 95; dismissal 
and his reply to Louis Philippe, 
102-3 

Habeas Corpus Act, suspension, 56, 

99-100, 216 
Harcourt, Sir William Vernon, letter to 

Lady Russell, 197 
Harrison, Frederic — 
Friendship with Lady Russell, 260, 

272 ; letter to Lady Agatha Russell, 

290 ; the Memorial address, 305-8 
Hatton, Sir Christopher, life, 82 
Hawick, 19, 27, 59 ; freedom presented 

to Lord John Russell, 35 
Herbert, Sidney, 146 ; resignation, 149 ; 

on the Italian question, 178 
Herzegovina, insurgents of, 246-7 
Hill, Rowland, Penny Postage, 61 
Hindhead, 121, 255, 265 
Hodgkinson, Mr., amendment, 212, 214 
Holland House, 23 ; dinners at, 25-6 
Holland, Lady, in Portugal, 51 ; death, 

1845-70, 71 
Holland, Lord, 26 ; in Portugal, 51 ; 

Napoleon on, 53 
Holmes, O. W., 299 ; death of, 284 
Home Rule Controversy, the, 267, 277 ; 

Lady Russell on, 282-3 



Hooker, Sir Joseph, 121, 261 

Hoole, Alderman, 172 

Hope, James, 10 

Horsman, Mr., opposition to Reform, 

204 
Howard, Lady Louisa, 239 and note * 
Howick, Lord, motion of, thrown out, 

68-9 (see also Grey, (3rd) Earl) 
Hudson, Mr., mission to Italy, 22 
Hudson, Sir James, letter from Turin 

to Lady John, 184-5 
Huguesson, Mr., 213 
Humboldt, friend in Berlin, 19 
Hume, appearance, 52 
Hungary, Kossuth's revolution, n6 

Ireland — 
The Viceregal Court, 54 ; situation in 
1843, ..68 ; Lady John Russell on the 
Irish question, 69, 78, 79, 8i~2 ; state 
of, 1845. ..74; condition in 1846... 
85-8, 94 ; Peel's measures for, 1846... 
85 ; Lady John Russell on the con- 
dition of, 89-90 ; measures for relief, 
90 ; the rebellion of 1848, prepara- 
tions, 96-7 ; suspension of the 
Habeas Corpus Act, 100 ; rumoured 
rebellion in the South, loi ; visit of 
the Queen, 1849. .. 104-5 ; reception 
of Lord Russell's letter to the 
Bishop of Durham, no ; Lord 
Russell's pamphlets, 215 ; the Fenian 
movement, 1867. ..216 ; the Irish 
Church question, 1868. ..216-17, 219 ; 
Gladstone's measure, 219 ; Lord 
Russell's sympathy towards, 221, 
223 ; Lady Russell and the Irish 
movement, 272-9, 301-3 

Irish University Bill, 238 and note ' 

Italy— 
and Austria, 54, 175 ; Lord John 
Russell and united Italy, 175, 177-89, 
247 a7id note ' ; Lord Granville and, 
176 ; federation, 179-85 ; first Par- 
liament, 183 ; defeat at Custozza, 
207 ; cession of Venetia, 209 ; the 
Russells in, 209-10 ; visit of Lord 
Russell, 1869. ..221-7 

Jamaica Bill, 1839.. .29 
Jaucourt, attache, ,176 



INDEX 



Z^7 



Jeffrey, Francis, Lord, letter to Lady 

John Russell, 89 
Joachim, Dr., 280 
Joachim, Miss Gertrude [see Russell, 

Mrs. Rollo) 
Josephine, Empress, 85, note * 
Jowett, Dr., letter to Lady Russell, 

248 

Keats, John, 258 

Kent, Duchess of, 29, 95 

King, Mr, Locke, franchise motion, 109, 

115 and noie^ 
Kinglake, cited, 157 ; his book, 196 
Kossuth, reception in London, 116 

Lacaita, Mr. (afterwards Sir James 
Lacaita), mission to the Russells, 
187-8 
Lansdowne House, Lord John Russell 

at, 60, 78 
Lansdowne, Lady, 27 
Lansdowne, Lord — 
and Lord Minto, 24, 27 ; Lord John 
Russell and, 78 ; Irish views, 81- 
2 ; and the suffrage, 105 ; refuses 
office, 123-4 i ^nd Lord John's 
resignation, 145 ; letters to 
Vienna, 154 
Lausanne, 165, 171 
Layard, Henry, 134, 218 
Lecky, W. E. H., a picture of Pembroke 

Lodge, quoted, 260 
Liberals — 
Position in 1837.. .27-8 ; number in 
1846... 90 ; Lady Russell on, 283 
Lincoln, President, 298 
Lister, Adelaide (see also Drummond, 
Mrs.), 35, 36, 49 and note^, 62, 80 
Lister, Elizabeth (Lady Melvill), 49 and 

note^, 79 
Lister, Isabel {see also Warburton, Mrs.), 

49 and note ', 79 
Lister, Miss, 32, 34, 35, 36, 38, 39-40. 62, 
109 ; letters to Lord John Russell, 

36, 42-3 
Lister, Tom {see Ribblesdale, Lord) 
Lockhart, "Life of Sir Walter Scott," 

272 
London — 
Lady John Russell's life in, 23 ; London 



society, Lady John Russell on, 84, 
87-8, 224 ; news of the revolution 
in France, 95-6 ; Lord John Russell 
returned for, 169-70 ; Italian con- 
spirators in, 173 

Longfellow, H. W., 258, 260, 299 

Lords, the House of — 

On the Corn question, 81 ; Peel's Irish 
Land Bill thrown out, 85 ; vote of cen- 
sure on Lord Palmerston, 107 ; Lord 
Russell's proposition, 219 ; Lady 
Russell on, 284 

Louis XIV, 266 

Louis XVIII, Napoleon's opinion regard- 
ing, 53-4 

Louis Philippe, and the Parisians, lo-li ; 
deposition in 1848. ..94-5 ; visits 
Pembroke Lodge, 102-3 

Louis, Princess, of Hesse, 222 

Lovelace, Lord, " Astarte," 221 note ' 

Lowe, Robert — 
On Disraeli, quoted, 212 ; opposition to 
Reform, 204, 205 ; his retort on Glad- 
stone, 205, note ' ; otherwise mentioned, 
202, 213 

Lowell, J. R., 260 ; " Democracy," 271 

Lyons, Lord, on the American situation 
195 ; in Paris, 226 

Lyttelton, Lady, on Prince Albert, 245 

Lytton, Bulwer, " The New Timon," 
quoted, 50 

McCarthy, Justin — 
Friendship with Lady Russell, 260-61, 
263 ; correspondence with Lady 
Russell, 275-6, 279 ; " Recollec- 
tions of Frances, Countess Russell," 
295-304 

Macaulay, letter to his sister, 73 ; other- 
wise mentioned, 259 

Malakoff, Due de, French Ambassador, 

174 
Malmesbury, Lord, accounts of the 

Crimea, 145 ; reports fall of the 

Derby Government, 176 
Manchester — 
Enfranchisement, 10 ; Anti-Corn Law 

League Bazaar, 63 ; attack on the 

prison van, 216 
Manchester, Bishop of, and education, 



3i8 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



Manning, Cardinal, 109 

Manzoni, " Carmagnola," 87 

Martineau, Dr., writings, 258 

Maynooth College, endowment of, 70 

Mazzini, 189, 221 

Melbourne, Lord — 

Dismissal, 1834. ..19, 21-2 ; Ministry, 
1837.. .27-8 ; return to power, 30; 
his famous remark, 42 ; Government 
of 1835. ..58 ; defeat in 1841...60 ; at 
Woburn, 61 ; otherwise mentioned, 
6, 24, 26 ; Mr. Gladstone's article 
on the Melbourne Ministry, 274 

Melgund, Lady {see also Minto, Lady) — 
Letter from Lady John Russell, 108-9 ; 
letters from Mr. Boileau, 132, 137-8 ; 
letters fromLordJohn Russell, 166, 170 

Melgund, Lord, 30, 41, 42, 70 

Melrose Abbey, 35 

Michelangelo, 210 

Militia Bill, the, 117 ; Lord John Russell 
defeated on, 123 

Mill, J. S., "Autobiography," 240 ; 
"Nature," Lady Russell's remarks, 
245 ; otherwise mentioned, 222 

Milton, 27, 258 ; " Paradise Lost," 271 

Minto House — 
Description, 1-4 ; return to in 183 1 
•..15; in 1834.. .19; the home at, 
30-1, 34, 45, 70, 239-40, 256, 273 
and note * ; Lord John Russell at, 
46 ; visit of Lord and Lady John 
Russell, 59 

Minto, Lady (mother of Lady Russell) — 
Home influence of, 9, 13 ; illness in 
Berlin, 9, 17, 18 ; death of her 
mother, 27 ; a description, 31 ; 
arrival of Lord John Russell, 35-6, 
40, 42, 43 ; letters to Lady Mary 
Abercromby, 37-8, 40-1, 43, 64 ; "A 
Border Ballad," 47-8 ; letters written 
from Endsleigh, 62-3 ; letter to 
Lord John Russell, 64-5 ; letters 
from Lady John Russell, 67, 96, 
108 ; illness, 1852. ..124 ; death, 128 ; 
mentioned in the letters, 25, 29-30, 
38, 39, 67, 240 

Minto, Lady (Lady Melgund) — 
Letters to Lady Russell, 192-193, 253 ; 
letters from Lord Russell, 193, 196, 
210, 213-14, 221, 234-5, 243-4 



Minto, Lord — 
At Minto, I, 6, 15 ; and Reform, 15 ; 
appointed Minister in Berlin, 15-19 ; 
and the Peel Ministry, 19, 22 ; First 
Lord of the Admiralty, 23, 24, 29-30, 
34-5) 38-43 ; Mrs. Drummond's recol- 
lections quoted, 31-3 ; and Lord 
John Russell, 42, 43 ; visits to Lady 
John Russell, 60 ; in London, 64 ; 
on Lord John Russell, Il8 ; death of 
Lady Minto, 129 ; letters from Lady 
John Russell, 139-40, 160-1, 170-2 ; 
on Lord John Russell's acceptance 
of the Colonial Seals, 151 ; death, 
191 : otherwise mentioned, 68, 75, 
108 

Minto village, 8, 14 

Moffatt, George, letter to Lady John 
Russell, 137 

Moore, Thomas — 

Songs at Bowood, 23-4, 27 ; " Re- 
monstrance," 56-7 ; lines quoted 
by Lady John Russell, 159 ; papers 
of, edited by Lord John Russell, 
164 ; otherwise mentioned, 259 

Morley, Lord — 
"Life of Gladstone" cited on Lord 
Russell's resignation, 140-4 ; Mr. 
RoUo Russell's letter to The Times, 
144-7 ; cited on the conduct of 
other Ministers, 146 ; otherwise 
mentioned, 278, 279 

Motley, J. L., on The Times, 194 

Morning Advertiser, and the Eastern 
Question, 133 

Morning Herald, and the Eastern Ques- 
tion, 133 

Morning Post, and Palraerston's Eastern 
policy, 132 

Morning Star, the, 299 

Napoleon I — 
in Elba, Lord John Russell's account, 
51-6 ; story of the poisoning, 55 ; 
letters to Josephine, 85, note ' 

Napoleon HI — 
and the Provisional Government, 95 ; 
his coup d'etat of December, 1851 
...117 ; policy, 152, 175, 179, 191 ; 
Orsini outrage on, 173 ; peace of 
Villafranca, 179-81 ; " Le Pape et le 



INDEX 



319 



Congres," 181 ; and Cavour, 183 ; 
Sir James Hudson on, 185 ; his idea 
of " United " Italy, 186 ; Garibaldi 
on, 189 ; and Lord Russell, 226 ; 
and the Franco - German War, 
228-9 ; prisoner of war, 230 ; at 
Chislehurst, 233 

National debt, reduction, 190 

National Guard of Paris 12 ; sing- 
ing the " Parisienne," 11 ; Louis 
Philippe and the, 102 

Neapolitan prisoners at Pembroke 
Lodge, 177 

Newcastle, Duke of, at the War Office, 
141, 142 ; otherwise mentioned, 149 

Newspapers, 166 

Nice, cession to France, 183, 184 

Nicholas, Emperor, 80, 130-1 ; partition 
of Turkey proposed, 131 ; death, 152 

Nonconformist deputation to Lord 
Russell, 252 

Norton, Mrs., description of Rogers, 
cited, 129-30 

Norwich, Hinds, Bishop of, iii 

Nottingham Castle, burning of, 15 

O'Brien, Smith, 97 

O'Brien, William, and Parnell, 279 

O'Connell, Daniel, 33 ; arrest in 1843 

...68 ; and Lord John Russell, 69 
O'Connor, Fergus, and the Chartists, 98 
Orsini, 173, 174 
Osborne, 71 
Owen, Sir Richard, 261 
Oxford, 227, 234 
Oxford movement, the. Lord John Russell 

and, 9 

Pacifico, Don, compensation, 106-7 

Palmerston, Lady, 42 

Palmer ston, Lord — 
On the dismissal of Lord Melbourne, 
cited, 21 ; and Grey, 75, 76, 78 ; at 
the Foreign Office, 75, 76, 78, 95, 
103, 106-7, 114; the Greek crisis, 
1850... 106-7, 114 ; his finest speech, 
107 ; the Queen's letter to Lord John 
Russell, 1 14-16; reception of Kossuth, 
116 ; the Militia Bill, 117, 123 ; and 
the coup d'etat, 1 17-18 ; dismissal, 
117, 120 ; and Lord John Russell, 



124 and note'', 126, 135, 141-2, 154-6, 
160 ; resignation on the Eastern 
Question and resumption of office, 
132 ; return to power, his first 
Cabinet, 143, 148-9 ; policy, 144 ; 
Lord John in the Colonial Office, 
149-51 ; policy in the Crimea, 152 ; 
his appeal to Lord John Russell, 156, 
158 ; his reply to Lord John's offer 
to resign, 160 ; China policy, 167-8 ; 
general election of 1857... 169 ; Con- 
spiracy to Murder Bill, 173 ; resigna- 
tion on the Conspiracy Bill amend- 
ment, 174 ; Ministry of 1859... 176 ; 
Italian policy, 176, 180-5, 186, 189 ; 
the Cabinet of 1859.. .178 ; social 
legislation under, 190 ; illness in 
1 865,.. 199 ; death, 200-1 ; otherwise 
mentioned, 34, 176 
Panmure, Lord, 154, 155 
Papal Bull, September, 1850. ..109-12 
Paris — 

Louis Philippe and, 10 ; deposition of 
Charles X, 10 ; carnival, 183. ..12 ; 
Wellington in, 53 ; life in, 224 ; 
visit of the Russells, 226 , horrors of 
the war, 230-2 
Paris, Comte de, 103, note 
"Parisienne," the, 11 
Parliament, opening in 1836, description, 

24 
Parnell, C. S., 275 and note'-g, 303 
Party Government, Lady Russell on, 282 
Pasolini, Count, memoir quoted, 209 
Patmore, Coventry, " 1867 "...212 
Paul, Herbert, on Coercion Bill, 94 note ; 
cited on the Commons' debate on 
the Greek crisis, 107 ; on Russell's 
resignation, 141 
Peel, Archibald, 214 ; letter from Lord 

Russell, 220 
Peel, General, 214 ; resignation, 211 
Peel, Lady Georgiana, letter from Lord 
Russell, 220 ; verses to, 262-3 » letter 
from Lady Russell, 270, 271, 272 
Peel, Sir Robert— 
The Ministry of 1835.. .21-2 ; his Tam- 
worth manifesto, 22 ; resignation, 
23 ; his position in 1837...28 ; return 
from Italy, 30 ; defeat, 42, 45 ; 
Ministry of 1841...61 ; the Corn Law, 



320 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



63f 11 ; position in 1843. ..68 ; resig- 
nation, 1845. ..70 ; and Russell, 71 ; 
influence, 74-5 ; gives up Protection, 
78 ; return to power, 1846. ..78-9 ; 
Lady John Russell on his speech, 
79, 80 ; Lord William Russell on, 
83 ; his measures for Ireland, 85 ; 
revenge of the Protectionists, 88 ; 
and the revolution in France, 94 ; 
his last speech and death, 107 ; 
Parliamentary courage, 250 ; Glad- 
stone on, 274 ; otherwise mentioned, 
19, 108, 214 
Peel, Sir Robert, Chief Secretary for 

Ireland, 216 
Peelites, alliance with the Whigs, 123 
Pembroke Lodge — 
Offered by the Queen to Lord John, 
91 ; the " Wishing Tree," 93 and 
note ' ; the home at, 100, 136, 249, 
253-4-5) 270 ; visit of Louis 
Philippe, 102-3 ; other French 
visitors, 103, note ' ; literary visitors, 
119 ; a few recollections, 12 1-2 ; 
Windsor summer-house, 162 ; visit 
of Garibaldi, 189 ; a Cabinet dinner, 
196 ; verses written for the summer- 
house, 197-8 ; visit of Queen Victoria, 
242 and note =, 243 ; children at, 256 ; 
a picture by Lecky, 260 ; Armenian 
refugees at, 285 ; otherwise mentioned, 
12, note^, 117, 226 

People's Charter, the, 1837. ..28 

Persigny, M., 155, 174 ; memoirs, 187 

Petersham, church at, 214 ; school at, 
103, 121, 233, 257, 287 

Petersham Park, 121 

Phillips, Wendell, 299 

Pitt, William, 50 

Plombieres, 179 ; secret treaty of, 183 

Poerio, 185 

Poor Laws, Lady John Russell on, 84 
284 

Pope, Napoleon's designs concerning 
the, 186 

Portal, Lady Charlotte, letters from Lady 
John, 172-3, 195,249-51, 254, 269-73 
278-9, 281-2 ; letter to Lady Russel 
268-9 ; Walpole's " Life of Lord hn 
Russell," 274 

Presbyterian Church of Scotland, 8-9 1 



Protectionists, abandoned by Peel, 78 ; 
and the Coercion Bill, 88 ; and the 
Peelites, 90 
Prussia, 55 ; and Denmark, 114 ; Napo- 
leon and, 175, 179 ; war on Austria, 
207 
Prussia, Crown Prince of, 232-3 
Prussia, Crown Princess of, 222-33 
Punch, ballad on Lord John Russell, 120 
Pusey, Dr., letter from Gladstone, g'uofed, 

212 
Puseyites, the, 85 

Putney House, Lady Russell's descrip- 
tion, 33 

Redcliffe, Lord Stratford de, policy, 

152 
Reform, Lord John Russell and, 58, 127, 

175, 201 
Reform Bill of 1831... 14-15, 58 ; 1832... 

15, 22, 58 ; Lord John Russell's Bill, 

132-40 ; 1854.. .134 ; Disraeli's Bill, 

175; 1866...203-4 
Reid, Stuart, cited, 126, 260 
Renens-sur-Roche, 165, 221 ; the Russells 

at, 233 
Revolutionary movem-ent of 1848. ..97 
Ribblesdale, Lady, ist Lady John Russell, 

29 ; marriage v^^ith Lord John 

Russell, 49 ; her death, 49 
Ribblesdale, (2nd) Lord, 49 
Ribblesdale, (3rd) Lord, 35, 49 and note ' 
Richmond, visit of Garibaldi, 189 
Richmond, Duke of (1836), 24 
Richmond Free Church, 257, 289, 305 
Richmond Park, 91, 122 
Rigby, Dr.,91 
Ripon, Lord, 61 
Robertson, Rev. F. W., 257 
Rodborough Manor, purchased by Lord 

John, 164 
Roebuck, Mr. — 
Motion of confidence, 107 ; motion for 

a Commission of Inquiry, 140, 144-7, 

250 ; the debate on, 148 ; comments 

on Lord John, 158 
Roehampton House, 15, 23, 26 
Rogers, Samuel — 
Letters to Lord and Lady John Russell 

119-20 ; note to Lady John, written 

in his ninetieth year, 129-30 ; break- 



INDEX 



321 



fasts, 130 ; Lady Russell's verses to, 
259 ; his reply, 260 

Roman Catholics, Lady John Russell 
on, 85, 1 10-13 ; the Papal Bull, 
September, 1850. ..109-12 

Romilly, Colonel, 135 and note ' ; on 
Lord John accepting the Colonial 
Seals, 151 ; letters from Lord Russell, 
223, 234 

Romilly, Lady Elizabeth, letters from 
Lady John Russell, 130-1, 134-6, 273 ; 
otherwise mentioned, 12, 29, 37, 39, 
112, 128, 166 

Romilly, Sir Samuel, 34, 135 note ' 

Roseneath, Lord John Russell's stay at, 
130-1 

Russell, Lord Arthur, 219 

Russell, Arthur, son of Mr. Rollo, 268 

Russell, Bertrand, son of Lord Amberley, 
242, note ', 246, 248 and note ', 266 

Russell, Earl (Frank, son of Lord 
Amberley), 248 and note^ 

Russell, Lady Emily, 243 

Russell, George William Gilbert, 99-100, 
205, 220, 242 

Russell, George W. E., on his uncle, 
quoted, 251 

Russell, John {see also Amberley, Lord), 
65, 71, 81, 90, 103, 113, 164, 193 

Russell, Lady Agatha, 128, 152, 172, 189, 
198, 201, 222, 233, 236, 243, 245, 249, 
250, 253, 265, 271, 280, 281, 287, 304 
Letters from — 
Mrs. Drummond, 31, 33 ; Lady Rus- 
sell, 265, 267, 283-5 ; Mrs. Warbur- 
ton, 286 ; Mr. Farrington, 289 ; the 
Rev. Stopford Brooke, 289 ; Mr. 
Frederic Harrison, 290 ; Mr. James 
Bryce, 290 

Russell, Lady Georgiana {see also Peel, 
Lady Georgiana), letter from Lady 
Russell, 199 ; letter from Lord 
Russell, 212-13 ; married to Mr. 
Archibald Peel, 214 ; otherwise men- 
tioned, 49, 62, 69, 162, 163, 167, 208 

Russell, (ist) Lady John (see Ribblesdale, 
Lady) 

Russell, Lady John — 
Birth and early life at Minto, i-io ; 
beginning of her Diaries, 10 ; visit 
to the Continent, 10-14 ; return 

Y 



to Minto, 14-15 ; at Roehampton 
House, 15 ; in Berlin, 16-19 ; return 
to Minto, 1834.. .19-20, 22-3 ; at the 
Admiralty, 23-33, 34, 43-4 ; descrip- 
tion by Mrs. Drummond, 32-3 ; 
visits of Lord John, 34-5 ; 36, 
38-42 ; her engagement, 42, 43 ; at 
Endsleigh, 61-3 ; birth of John, 65 ; 
lines to her son, 65 ; at Woburn, 
65 ; illness in Edinburgh, 69, 71-80, 
89-90 ; on the government of Ireland, 
85-6 ; at Chorley Wood, 90 ; illness 
in 1847, 91 ; birth of George Wil- 
liam Gilbert, 99-100 ; the Petersham 
School, 103, 257 ; birth of Francis 
Albert Rollo, 103 ; recollections of 
the crisis in December, 1851...117 ; 
book of poems, 119 ; and Samuel 
Rogers, 119-20 ; birth of Mary 
Agatha, 128 ; death of her mother, 
128-29 ; in Vienna, 152, 154 ; Italian 
sympathies, 186 ; visit of Mr. Lacaita, 
187-8 ; relations with her father, 
191 ; lines for the summerhouse at 
Pembroke Lodge, 197-8 ; return to 
Endsleigh, 208 ; in Venice, 209-10 ; 
on Irish Church disestablishment, 
217, 219 ; visit to Italy, 1869... 
221-27 ; her views on elementary 
education, 225-6 ; in Paris, 226 ; 
in Switzerland, 233-4 ; at Cannes, 
234-6 ; sorrows of 1874. ..242 ; death 
of Lord Amberley, 247-8 ; the " Life 
of Prince Albert," 250 ; death of 
Lord Russell, 252-4 ; her subse- 
quent life, 255-6 ; " Family Wor- 
ship," 256 ; her love of children, 
256-7 ; her religion, 8, 9, 257 ; 
favourite authors, 257-9 '■> hnes on 
Samuel Rogers, 259 ; his reply, 
260 ; friendships, 259-61 ; " Lines to 
Georgy," 262-3 ; sympathy for Ire- 
land, 272, 273, 275-9, 301-3 ; on the 
home at Minto, 273, note ' ; lines 
written after reading " Leaves from 
a Prison Diary," 277-8 ; visit to the 
Queen, 282 ; on Home Rule, 283 ; 
illness in 1897. ..286 ; last illness 
and death, 287-8 ; funeral, 290-1 ; 
" Lines on Death," 291 ; " Recollec- 
tions " by Justin McCarthy, 295-304 ; 



322 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



memorial address by Frederic Har- 
rison, 305-8 
Russell, Lady Victoria (see also Villiers, 

Lady Victoria), 34, 49, 60, 86 
Russell, Lord Charles, letter to Lady John 

Russell, 108 
Russell, Lord John — 
and the Oxford movement, 9 ; efforts 
for Reform, 10, 58, 127, 132-6, 201 ; 
loss of the first and introduction 
of the second Reform Bill, 14-15 ; 
his engagement to Lady Fanny 
Elliot, 32-3, 35-44 ; at Minto, 34 ; 
mentioned in the earlier letters, 
34-44 ; his speech on sugar, 41, 81 ; 
returned for the City of London, 
45 ; early life and career, 48-58 ; 
his account of Napoleon, 51-6 ; the 
" Remonstrance " of Thomas Moore, 
56-7 ; character and personality, 
59-60, 64, 90, 118, 169-70, 236-7, 
250 ; and the Queen, 60 ; on Ends- 
leigh, quoted, 61 ; and the Corn 
Laws, 63, 73-7 ; speech on the Irish 
question, 69 ; his Free Trade letter, 
70 ; called to office, 71-7 ; letters 
from Lady Russell, 72, 75, 79, 80, 
82-4, 86-8, 128, 131, 148, 151, 157-9, 
162, 191 ; the first Reform Bill, 
77 ; Irish views, 78, 79, 81-2, 85-6 ; 
opposes the Coercion Bill, 1846... 88 ; 
his Ministry, 1846. ..88 ; measures for 
the relief of Ireland, 90 ; the offer 
of Pembroke Lodge, 91 ; his Irish 
Coercion Bill, 94 ; suspension of the 
Habeas Corpus Act, 100 ; school 
founded at Petersham, 103 ; at Bal- 
moral, 103-4 ; his letter to the 
Bishop of Durham, 109-11 ; resig- 
nation and resumption of office, 
109-10 ; events leading to the fall 
of the Ministry, 1 13-17 ; resig- 
nation, 117 ; and the dismissal of 
Palmerston, 117, 120 ; foreign policy 
119 ; defeated on the Militia Bill, 123 ; 
and the Protestant Nonconformists, 
123-4 ; his attitude towards Lord 
Aberdeen, 124, 126-7 I and Palmer- 
ston, 124 and note ', 126, 160 ; in the 
Coalition Cabinet, 127 ; the Reform 
Bill withdrawn, 136-40 ; resignation, 



140-1 ; the attack on, 143-4 ; fails to 
form a Government, 148-9 ; British 
Plenipotentiary at Vienna, 149, 
150-2 ; in the Colonial Office, 
149-51 ; his policy at Vienna, 153 ; 
resignation, 158-9 ; " Life of Fox," 
164, 209 ; lecture at Exeter Hall, 
164 ; in Italy, 165 ; his speech on the 
Chinese question, 168-9 > returned 
for the City, 169-70 ; reception at 
Sheffield, 17 1-2 ; the amendment to 
Lord Palmerston's Conspiracy Bill, 
173-4 ; Italian sympathies, 175, 
176, 189 ; Foreign Secretary under 
Palmerston, 176, 190 ; his share in 
the creation of Italy, 177-85 ; de- 
termines England's Italian policy, 
186 ; despatch of 27th October, 
i860, quoted, 188 ; becomes Earl 
Russell, 192-3 ; speech on the 
American War, 197 ; Prime Minis- 
ter, 201 ; the Reform Bill, 203-4 ; 
in Venice, 209-10 ; his pamphlets . 
on Ireland, 215, 217, 219, 225-6 ; 
character from the Diary, 215 ; visit 
to Italy, 1869. ..221-7 ; the " Intro- 
duction," quoted, 223 ; in Paris, 226 ; 
opinion on education, 234-5 ; ^^ 
Cannes, 234-6 ; " Essays on the His- 
tory of the Christian Religion," 
238-9; sorrows of 1874. . .242 ; the 
Herzegovina insurgents, 247 ; his 
last years, 250-1 ; Nonconformist de- 
putation to, 252 ; death, 252 ; Glad- 
stone on, 274 ; recollections of Justin 
McCarthy, 295 ; and the American 
Civil War, 298 ; otherwise, mentioned, 
6, 9, 23, 68, 161, 172-3 213, 218 
Letters to — 

Lord Melbourne, 30 ; Lady Mary 
Abercromby, 45-6 ; Lady Russell, 
36, 46, 71, 74, 75, 76, 78, 80-3, 85, 86, 
88, 104, 127, 129, 150-2, 162 ; Duke 
of Bedford, 58, 144 ; Lady Minto, 
62-3 ; the electors of London, 74 ; 
Lord Clarendon, 155 ; Lady Minto 
(Lady Melgund), 166, 170, 193, 196, 
210, 213-14, 221, 234, 243-4 ; Lady 
Georgiana Russell, 212-13, 220 ; 
Archibald Peel, 220 ; Colonel 
Romilly, 223, 234 



INDEX 



323 



Russell, Lord William, letter to Lady 
John, 82-3 

Russell, Lord Wriothesley, 45 note ; 
letter to Ladyi John, 143-4 ; on the 
attacks on Lord John, 145 

Russell, Odo (afterwards Lord Ampthill), 
222 and note' ; letter to Lord John, 
188 

Russell, Rollo — 

103 ; his letter to The Times, 144-7 ; 
letters from Lady Russell, 202-3, 213, 
215, 219, 224, 225, 227, 231-2, 280 ; 
marriage, 255, 280 ; letter from 
Mrs. Sinclair, 290 ; otherwise men- 
tioned, 240, 244, 271 

Russell, Mrs. Rollo (Miss Alice Godfrey), 
death of, 255 

Russell, Mrs. Rollo (Miss Gertrude 
Joachim), 280 ; letter from Lady 
Russell, 282 

Russell, Rachel, daughter of Lord 
Amberley, 223, 242 and note ', 243-4 

Russell, Rachel, Lady, 307 

Russell, Sir Charles, and Parnell, 279 

Russell, WiUiam, Lord, 58 

Russia — 
Napoleon and, 55 ; and England, 
Napoleon on, 56 ; a d the Greek 
Crisis, 107 ; Baron Brunow's wish 
for, 113 ; Palmerston's policy to- 
wards, 116; events leading to the 
Crimean War, 13 1-2 ; Lord John's 
negotiations, 152-3 

St. Fillans, the Russells at, 221, 253 
Salisbury, (2nd) Marquis of — 
On Disraeli's Franchise Bill, quoted, 

212 ; and Reform, 213 
Salisbury, (3rd) Marquis of, 227 
San Remo, portrait of Lord John at, 189 ; 

the Russells at, 221-7 
Sardinia, the King of, and Garibaldi, 

i88 ; Lord John's speech on, 192 
Savoy, Napoleon's designs, 183 ; cession 

of, 184, 228 
Schleswig-Holstein, war with Denmark, 

114 ; negotiations, 199 
Scotland, Lady Russell's love for, 35, 266 
Scott, Sir Walter— 
" Lay of the Last Minstrel," 3 ; at 

Minto, 8 ; " Ivanhoe," 24 ; " Heart 



of Midlothian," 241 ; otherwise men- 
tioned, 258 

Scottish Church, the, secession from, 66 

Security of the Crown Bill, 97 

Sedan, 232 

Sedition Bill, Ireland, 85 

Selborne, Lord, 250 

Sevigne, Mme. de, story related by, 
221-2 

Shakespeare, 258, 268-9 

Sheffield, reception given to Lord John 
Russell, 171 

Shelley, 258 

Sherman, General, 299 

Shooting, Lady Russell on, 61 

Simpson, Sir James, letter to Lady 
John Russell, 99-100 

Sinclair, Mrs., 286 and note ' ; letter to 
Rollo Russell, 290 

Slave question, the, 297-8 ; the Jamaica 
Bill, 29 

Smith, John Abel — 

Letter from Lord John, 138; letters 
to Lady Russell, 150; his fears for 
Lord John's seat, 169 

Smith, Sydney, 259 ; " Life and Letters," 
265 

Soult, Marshal, 28 ; at the coronation, 
1838. ..29 

South Africa, 308 

Spain — 

Napoleon on, 52-3 ; Napoleon's policy 
towards, 56 ; Prince Leopold's candi- 
dature, 228-9 

Spaventa, in England, 177 

Speculative Society of Edinburgh Uni- 
versity, 51 

Spencer, Herbert, 240 ; " The Bias o 
Patriotism," 241 

Spencer, (2nd) Earl, death, 21 

Spencer, (4th) Earl, Letter to Lady 
John, 138-9 

Spencer, (5th) Earl, 252 

Stanley, Dean, pamphlet, 217 ; letter to 
Lady Russell, 248 

Stanley, Lady Augusta, 248 and note ' 

Stanley, Lord, afterwards 15th Lord 
Derby, 1869.. .61, 70, 78 ; and the 
franchise, 109 

Stockmar, Baron, 245 and note ' ; Glad- 
stone's estimation, 252 



324 



LADY JOHN RUSSELL 



Sugar question, Lord John RussfU's 

speech, 41 
Sumner, Charles, 299 
Swanwick, Miss Anna, 272 
Swift, Dean, on hes, quoted, 221 
Switzerland, 165 ; visits of the Russells, 

233 
Sydenham, Lord, on Lord John Russell's 
sugar speech, 41 

Talleyrand, Napoleon and, 56 

Tavistock, 56, 58, 61 

Taylor, Jeremy, 27 

Taylor, Sir Henry — 

Visit to Pembroke Lodge, 241-2 ; 
" Philip van Artevelde," 260 ; a pic- 
ture of Lady Russell, 261 ; letter 
from Lady Russell, 266 

Tennyson, Alfred, 258, 260, 265 ; Aid- 
worth taken by Lord Russell, 244 ; 
death of, 281 ; " Life of Tennyson " 
by his son, 287-8 

Test and Corporation Acts, repeal, 58, 
252 

Thackeray, 260 ; " Sterne " and " Gold- 
smith," 119 

Times, The — 
Lord Melbourne's dismissal, 21-2 ; and 
Palmerston, 133 ; Rollo Russell's 
letter, 144-7 ; ^^ the state of 
America, 194 ; Lord Russell's letter, 
225, 246 ; publication of the secret 
document, 228 

Tory Party — 

Breaking up of, 7 ; position in 1843... 68; 
influence of Lord Derby on, 215 

Tractarianism, 109-12 

Trent, the, Confederate emissai-ies seized, 
194, 200 

Trevelyan, Mr., and the Chartists, 98 

Trevelyan, Sir George, " Life of 
Macaulay," cited, 6 

Tuileries, the clock incident, 94 ; a dinner 
at, 226 

Turin, the Parliament of i860.. .183 

Turkey — 
Events leading to the Crimean War, 
13 1-2 ; the Herzegovina insurgents, 
246 ; Lady Russell on, 283 

Tyndall, Mrs., 265 

Tyndall, Professor, 232, 261, 265 



Unionists, Lady Russell on the, 283 
United States, European policy towards, 

197 
Unsted Wood, 70 

Vattel, jurist, quoted, 188 

Venetia, and the Federation, 179-80 ; 
cession to Italy, 183, 209 

Vestris, Mme., 33 

Victor Emmanuel — 

Policy, 176 ; and the Peace of Villa- 
franca, 180-1 ; and Garibaldi, 186-8 ; 
King of Italy, 188 ; entry into Venice, 
209 

Victoria, Queen — 

First Parliament, 27-8 ; coronation, 29 ; 
and Peel, 30 ; Court balls, 28-30 ; and 
Lord John Russell, 50, 60, 71, 73, 88, 
141 ; on events in France, 95 ; the 
Chartist movement, 97-8 ; letter to 
Lord John Russell regarding the 
public prayer, 99 ; at Balm.oral, 104 ; 
visit to Ireland, 1849. ..104-5 ; 2nd 
Palmerston, the letter to Lord John 
Russell, 114-16, 117; conversation 
with Lady John Russell on Palmer- 
ston, 116 ; visits to Pembroke Lodge, 
121, 242 ; sends for Lords Aberdeen 
and Lansdowne, 123 ; letter to Lord 
John Russell asking him to serve 
under Lord Aberdeen, 125 ; Palmer- 
ston's return to power, 148-9 ; Lord 
Derby's Cabinet, 1858. ..174 ; sends 
for Granville and afterwards for Pal- 
merston, 176 ; and Italy, 178, 181 ; 
visit to Coburg, 191 ; death of the 
Prince Consort, 194-5 ! letter to Lord 
Russell on Palmerston's illness, 200 ; 
refuses Lord Russell's resignation, 
1 866... 206 ; lays foundation stone 
of the Albert Hall, 214 ; letter to 
Lady Russell at Cannes, 236 ; in- 
vitation to Lord Russell, 241 ; letter 
to Lady Russell on death of Lady 
Amberley, 242, 243 ; character, 245 ; 
letter to Lady Russell on death of 
Lord Amberley, 249 ; letter to Lady 
Russell on death of Lord Russell, 
252-3 ; requests Lady Russell to 
remain at Pembroke Lodge, 253 ; 
letter to Lady Russell on marriage 



INDEX 



325 



of her son, 280 ; visit of Lady Russell 

to, 282 
Vienna, 53 ; Conference of, 149, 150-2 ; 

" Vienna Note," the, 132 
Villafranca, peace of, 179-81 
Villiers, Lady Victoria — 
Letter to Lady Russell, 214 ; letter from 

Lady Russell, 219 ; marriage, 192 ; 

death of, 255 ; otherwise mentioned, 

192, 255 
Villiers, Montagu, Bishop of Durham, 

vote of thanks to Lord John Russell, 

164 
Villiers, Mrs. E., 166 
Voysey, Mr., 285-6 

Wales, Prince of, illness, 1871... 235-6 

Wales, Princess of, 236 

Walpole, Sir Spencer, 94 note ; cited on 
Lord John's resignation, 156 ; " Life 
of Lord John Russell," 192, 273-4 \ 
" The History," quoted, 203, 215 

Walton, Isaac, 27 

War Office incompetence, 140, 151 

Warburton, Mrs. (see also Lister, Isabel) — 
Letter from Lady Russell, 276-7 ; 
letter to Lady Agatha Russell, 286 

Waterloo, Lady John Russell's impres- 
sions, 16-17 ; George IV and, 221 

Wellington, Duke of — 
Policy, 7 ; resignation in 1830... 10 ; 
Waterloo, 16 ; the temporary Cabi- 
net, 19, 21-2 ; personahty from the 
letters, 28 ; despatches, 51 ; Napo- 
leon on, 53 ; and George IV, 221 



Westcott, Dr., 266 

Westminster Abbey, coronation of Queen 

Victoria, 29 
Westminster School, 49 
Whigs, the — 

Position in 1841...61 ; and the Corn 

Laws, 78 ; and Peel's Sedition Bill, 

85 ; alliance with the Peelites, 123 ; 

and Russell, 126-7 
Wicksteed, Rev. Philip H., speech of, 271 
William IV— 

Dismisses Melbourne, 21-2 ; opening 

of Parliament, February, 1836. ..24 ; 

death, 27 ; and Brougham, 221 
Windsor Castle, 42, 76, 122, 198, 241, 242, 

282 ; Lady John Russell at, 116, 282 
Wiseman, pastoral letters (1850), no 
Woburn Abbey, 49, 61, 65, 102-3, ii7> 

160, 198-9 
War, Lady John Russell on, 230-4 
Woman, Lady John Russell on her posi- 
tion, 227 
Wood, Lady Mary, 98 
Wood, Sir Charles, 105, 141 ; retirement, 

202 and note ^ 
Wyhoff, Chevalier, "Reminiscences of 

an Idler," 26 



Yarrow, 59 

Young Ireland party, 96 



Zurich, Congress at, Napoleon's plans, 
180-2 



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